Walking the Path Between Welcome and Exile
by Laurie-ky
Summary: BB/TS, BB/SR. For six years, Bruce Banner has traveled the world running from those who want to control the Hulk. Now that he and the Avengers have stopped Loki and the Chitauri, he knows the sensible thing to do is to leave while the city is in chaos. And yet, the connections he's making with the other Avengers, this strange group of talented individuals, are tempting him to stay.
1. Tony

"The only thing more unthinkable than leaving was staying; the only thing more impossible than staying was leaving. I didn't want to destroy anything or anybody. I just wanted to slip quietly out the back door, without causing any fuss or consequences, and then not stop running until I reached Greenland." ― Elizabeth Gilbert, _Eat, Pray, Love_

**Tony**

A hand waved in front of his face, and Bruce blinked. He tasted dust in the back of his throat, cataloged it as familiar, the product of pulverized concrete and bricks, smelled smoke from fires, and something metallic and alien that was faintly nauseating.

"Are you back yet? On a scale of one to ten, with ten being equivalent to a Cheech and Chong level of stoned after smoking that giant doobie, just what number of dazed are you right now? Me, I'm guessing about a nine. Two minutes ago I'd have given you a twelve."

He understood the words but dismissed them as irritating. He closed his eyes and hoped the voice would stay quiet.

"O-kay, be right back. JARVIS, keep me informed of Doctor Banner's condition."

After the sound of footsteps had faded away, he opened his eyes and looked up into blue sky. He was on a rooftop, sprawled on his back and naked under a blanket, with something soft under his head. He shifted his muscles a little, his body sore with that familiar deep painful ache.

His head hurt. It usually did, after he'd turned green. He sat up cautiously. Somebody had been talking to him, but he hadn't recognized the voice. His memories started to settle into place, his last clear one meeting up with the team Fury had thrown together to stop Loki. They'd been surprised and maybe a little hopeful to see him, as they'd stood on the viaduct in poor battered Manhattan.

Tony had led a huge alien sky serpent to them, and he'd let the other guy out. Enough memories were returning to know that Loki and his invasion were defeated. Time to move on.

From what he could see, he guessed he was still in New York. He blinked hard, and cautiously started to move his limbs, doing his usual damage assessment. Huh. So the Hulk hadn't escaped the city, hadn't fled to the mountains.

He got to his feet, wrapping the blanket around himself awkwardly. Clothes, he needed to find something to wear. He was almost to an exit when Tony limped through the door, hands full.

Ah, looking around at the sheer opulence and breadth of this skyscraper, and with Tony here, he guessed he was at Stark Tower.

Tony circled him, grinning when the blanket slipped and Bruce had to grab it before it hit the floor. He handed him a pair of sweat pants and a T-shirt, and kept the orange juice and aspirin.

"Awkward waking up naked in a strange place, isn't it? We'll have to compare walk of shame stories sometime."

Bruce didn't bother to answer, just handed Tony the blanket and got slowly dressed. The clothes were soft and worn, and weren't really what he thought a man as wealthy as Tony would wear.

Tony had on a Black Sabbath T-shirt and jeans. So he was off Iron Man duty, then. Things must be under control. Bruce wondered if the rest of the guys were done being superheroes for the day, too.

"Here." Tony thrust the juice at Bruce. "S.H.I.E.L.D.'s files say you get thirsty after you wake up. They don't mention aspirin, but as I'm a genius, I'm guessing you've got one hell of a Hulk hangover ."

He frowned and put his arm around Bruce when he didn't take the drink or the aspirin. "Still a little out of it, aren't you? C'mon. We've got a date with the team. Did the Hulk explain about meeting for shawarmas?"

x x x

Tony took him to a bedroom larger than Bruce's borrowed cabin in Canada, or really, most of the places he'd stayed in the last six years. It had sleek, crisp furnishings and an enormous bed covered with a black silky comforter. He steered Bruce to the bed and made him sit down.

"Doctor Banner," was all he said, but he'd lifted up an eyebrow which Bruce translated to mean _prove to me you still have a working brain_, and held out the large bottle.

"Umm. Thanks." He accepted it and twisted off the cap and drank a third of the sweet and tangy juice down without stopping.

Tony tossed him the aspirin bottle and he swallowed three of them, chasing them down with the rest of the juice.

"Loki?" Bruce's voice sounded unsteady to his own ears.

"In custody. For real this time. Thor's got him fixed up so that he can't use any powers. The Chitauri – those space crazies – all dead."

"People have got to be hurt. How bad?"

"Bad enough. There are a lot of folks with injuries and it's chaotic. There are missing people lists and there are deaths. The lists keep growing. But it could have been so much worse."

"Yeah. Did I hurt anybody?" Bruce always dreaded hearing the answer to this question.

"You creamed Loki. I think he's still dizzy from you smashing him into my tower floor. You went after the bad guys, Bruce. Stop worrying about it."

Tony grinned wickedly at him, eyes dancing a little. "You did give Thor a love tap. You were a little hyper and he was handy. No biggie."

He didn't remember that. At best, Bruce only ever had bits of memory to piece things together after his skin had started rippling and the change began. Transformation. Metamorphosis into a monster.

Tony stepped away, opened a walk-in closet and disappeared inside. Then he returned to the doorway. "You're smaller than me, but my stuff should fit you pretty well. Do you want to pick something out?"

He didn't even have a toothbrush now, but he'd get by. He had a lot of experience with starting over.

Tony waved a hand at him when he didn't answer. "Hey, Bruce. I'm not going to make you wear something you don't want to wear."

"Or make me... stay?" Not that Tony could. But Bruce wanted to see Tony's face when he answered.

Tony's eyes sharpened, locked onto Bruce's.

"I'm not a big fan of being made to stay somewhere you don't want to be." Tony said it lightly, almost jokingly, but his eyes shadowed momentarily. Ah. Nothing like being forced to build weapons in a cave to help with some soul-searching. But Tony and him, they'd had some history before they'd met on the helicarrier. And it was a little mean, but he wanted to push Tony just a bit. Like he'd done to Natasha when she'd come to Kolkata. He wanted to know what would happen if he put pressure on this man.

"What's going on with you?" Tony stepped into the room, moved closer to him. For the first time since he'd woken up Bruce registered the soft blue glow of the arc reactor as it gleamed through Tony's T-shirt.

He didn't hold a grudge against Tony. But he wanted to read him, see for himself what his reaction would be to Bruce Banner, the Hulk, having a grievance against him. Could Tony handle it? Would he then finally see fear bloom on Tony's face?

"The traps for General Ross? You made them, Tony. Umm... Being kept against my will was okay with you then." He threaded an angry note, low and menacing, into his deliberately soft speech.

Tony sat down beside him. It was maybe a little too close for conventional social standards but Bruce didn't move. "I made some mistakes. I'm sorry. Can I build you a lab to make up for that?"

"Mmm... Love can't be bought by money, right? Probably not forgiveness either."

"And yet, you do forgive me. You're not angry with me, Doctor Banner." Tony turned on the bed and gave him that wicked smile again, and Bruce shook his head. Tony was a perceptive son-of-a-bitch. He crossed his arms over his chest, feeling unsettled.

On the helicarrier Tony had poked at him, figuratively and literally, and there had only been curiosity and an invitation in his eyes. _Work with me, hang out with me, I know you can keep up with me_. He'd done all of those things with Tony and it had been good. They'd fallen into working together like they'd been doing research and lab work for years as partners, until Loki had unleashed the Hulk from Bruce's control.

"Doctor Banner. Bruce. This could be the start of a beautiful friendship. Work for me. No, better, work with me. I want to keep you around, sure. I mean, you're you, and excuse me, but did I mention that you're brilliant? You're brilliant. And you get my science jokes. Nobody gets my science jokes. For that alone, I'd want to hire you. And the team. We need you. Your mind, your strengths." Tony's eyes were really very expressive, Bruce noted.

All the time spent with S.H.I.E.L.D. agents ready to exercise their trigger fingers, he'd been on edge. Even in the lab on the helicarrier with Tony, although he'd honestly thought he could handle it. He hadn't accounted for Loki.

"S.H.I.E.L.D. wants the monster. Fury even built me my own special room. It was never about my expertise in gamma radiation."

Tony frowned and shook his head slowly. "Now that isn't true. We did need you to find the tesseract by tracking its gamma radiation signature and you were – as I keep telling you - brilliant about it. But the Avengers isn't S.H.I.E.L.D. Okay, we're connected to S.H.I.E.L.D., and we have some people on loan from S.H.I.E.L.D. That's true. But as a team we have autonomy, with Rogers in charge. The way the Avengers Initiative works, we're the Hail Mary pass, the last stand, a desperate measure for a desperate time. I know we all got off to a rocky start, but we came together and we got the job done."

He nudged Bruce with his shoulder. "We'll be needed again. And we want you with us, Bruce."

Bruce started running a thumb over the knuckles of his other hand. "You're speaking for everybody? Captain America? That archer? I don't even know his name. And I very much doubt that Agent Romanoff wants me to be on the team."

Natasha's terrified face flashed again in his mind.

"Look, just, give us a chance to convince you, okay? Come with me and let's be with the team tonight. A meal. Breaking bread together. It's on me." Bruce thought that Tony sounded sincere. He was feeling off kilter here, and Tony was persuasive.

He really should leave. It was the best option. He didn't know who he could trust. The team? But they'd fought a battle together; they'd done some good.

He wasn't opposed to doing some good.

He thought about what Tony had said. _It's on me._" Tony could become a friend, maybe. He knew about the other guy and wasn't fazed by him. He'd trusted Bruce from the moment they'd met, Bruce thought. That had been refreshing. The question was, did he trust Tony back?

Maybe for tonight, he could take a break and enjoy Tony's company. Genius, sexy, endearing Tony, who'd shared his snack with Bruce on the helicarrier like they were eight-year-olds and were hanging out in their secret clubhouse.

Bruce might like to play the moth to Tony's flame before he left. Nothing would come of it. He was always careful not to get burned by his attractions to men or women. Tony wouldn't even know that Bruce appreciated his charms.

He thought about the Avengers, the expressions on their faces when he'd showed up to help fight. He might like to see them again.

He met a lot of people, connected briefly with them and moved on. He didn't get to keep friends or lovers. But there were small times that warmed his soul, when he spent a few hours with a person that he wished he could take to bed. He had made friends, of a sort, as he fled from country to country, and he would fix their washing machines or stitch up cuts for them.

Once he had lofty plans, big dreams involving a home, a wife or a husband, maybe even children. He'd wanted to have respect from colleagues and lifelong friendships, to know the joys of researching, see people being helped by his science discoveries or by being their doctor. Poof. All gone.

He lived in the moment now. But sometimes, those moments were good.

He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He unfolded his arms and nudged Tony.

"Well, if it's on you, then... okay. I'll come. And you pick out the clothes. I'll take a shower."

"So you trust me? With the selection? I mean, I might toss you my 'Top Ten Reasons Why Engineers Do It Better' T-shirt." Tony waggled his eyebrows and Bruce felt a little exasperated and a lot amused.

"I trust you." Bruce stretched his arms above his head. He hoped the shower would help loosen him up.

"We aren't talking about my T-shirt, are we? Even though it's awesome. I like reason number six the best. 'We create the world's largest erections.'"

Bruce felt a smile fighting to emerge, then gave in and chuckled. "No, we aren't talking about shirts.

He nudged Tony again, and then yawned. He felt an impulse to offer something to Tony, to find common ground. "But, um, I used to have an 'Absolute Zero is Cool' T-shirt in grad school. I could always tell who was into science and who wasn't when I wore it." He yawned again. "Sorry. I have to pay the piper after the other guy dances."

Tony jumped up from the bed. "Okay, let's hustle. I have a feeling that when you go down, you'll be really down for a while."

x x x

He started having second thoughts about coming on this little outing while he was sitting with the team Fury had cobbled together, in Tony's borrowed clothes, methodically eating a meal near the heart of the destruction unleashed earlier today.

Staying because Tony asked him? That wasn't a smart decision. He should have escaped as soon as he'd woken up, taken advantage of the chaos that S.H.I.E.L.D., plus the Army, police, and National Guard, were dealing with after the battle.

He should have disappeared. Surfaced somewhere far away, out of US jurisdiction, and hope that he'd shaken off his trackers.

Fury had built that cell for him. Caging him was at least an option with S.H.I.E.L.D. If Thunderbolt Ross found him, he would throw him in a hole. He'd promised to do that the last time he caught Bruce. The man hated him with a passion, and Bruce suspected it was as much because he'd slept with his daughter as it was because of being the Hulk.

Tony said, "This is my first time eating a shawarma. I like it." He'd been trying to get some conversation going between the six people seated at this table, but the Avengers seemed too exhausted to really respond. Even Tony, legendary in his ability to be tireless and persuasive ( and sharp with his tongue), was flagging.

Bruce tried to help him out. "I've had it before. In Sierra Leone." And that was as much as he could muster.

He hadn't eaten a shawarma since his last night in Freetown, before hitching a ride with some of the Lassa Fever researchers to Kolkata. He suspected now that one of the researchers that he'd gotten to know had been a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. Maybe Michael. Michael had gotten him a place on the plane, when Bruce had told him he was going to leave Freetown.

Maybe he'd ask Natasha. She'd told him her spy agency had known where he was since he trashed Harlem and ran for Canada.

It didn't really matter.

They were the only customers in the small, mostly still in one piece shop. Really, since the conversation had totally died, the only sound besides those of some of them eating – Thor and himself, mostly – was the broom the shop owner was wielding in the corner.. Thor was taking big bites of his food, but for a mythological legend he looked subdued. Worried about his brother, probably. Bruce had a flash of memory of smashing Loki until he wasn't any kind of threat. The Hulk really didn't like it when egomaniacs decided to roll right over people.

Cap looked like he'd rather lay his head down on the table and sleep than finish his food. Natasha nibbled at her pita bread, and Clint Barton, the archer who'd been introduced to him as Hawkeye , was slowly eating a fry.

He'd caught small, almost secret glances between the two S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents. He peeked around the table and seen how Barton was touching Natasha with his leg. Ah. Friends. Maybe lovers, ex-lovers.

Fury wasn't here. He had a feeling Tony hadn't invited him.

He ate a fry and turned to look out the window. Yeah. There was no improvement from what he'd seen when he'd ridden a motorcycle into Manhattan. He'd turned the engine off and looked at the people he'd last seen on the helicarrier. "Sorry," he'd told Natasha. He'd been apologizing for what he'd done to her and for having to become the other guy again in front of her.

As usual, he had few memories to recall after the Hulk had been in charge. There were brief flashes of faces and bodies and things flying through the air or crumpling like Bruce Banner would crumble a paper bag and they didn't follow one another in a coherent and orderly fashion. It wasn't like he could arrange those mental snapshots in an album. Natasha's face. Guess he'd been ticked off about Kolkata. Really, he should have chased Nick Fury, instead of her. Swatting that aircraft out of the sky. He hoped, he really, really hoped, that he hadn't killed the pilot.

Falling. Clouds. The ground coming closer and closer.

He'd known where to go. The tracking program he and Tony had devised on the helicarrier had pinpointed the tesseract's location in the heart of Manhattan. Besides, as he rode the borrowed motorcycle down streets and sidewalks, it was easy enough to follow the trail of chaos to the battleground. The streets where the team was fighting against the invaders carried the look of a war zone. Even the very air of Manhattan reeked of destruction.

It still did.

x x x

He stopped fidgeting with his spoon, pushed his chair away from the table, and stood up. So did the rest of them. They were done.

Nobody had talked much during dinner, not even Tony, but Cap told them Fury wanted everyone at S.H.I.E.L.D.'s Manhattan office tomorrow to debrief again. Apparently, while the Hulk had been calming down, everyone else had given a preliminary report. This time, though, the analysts would be picking everything apart. Information was power, after all. They'd had real honest-to-god space invaders, and S.H.I.E.L.D. was in charge of developing strategies for planetary defense.

Tony moved to Bruce's side, "You know you're coming home with me, right? You don't have to sleep at Chez S.H.I.E.L.D.; I hear their accommodations suck."

Bruce nodded. God, he was really, really tired. "I probably could sleep on a bed of nails, but yeah, thanks, Tony."

Tony looked him up and down. "Okay, just hang in a little longer. I need to have a word with Cap." Tony gave Bruce a friendly slap on his bicep, then limped off to where Steve was talking to Barton.

Bruce closed his eyes for a moment, than jerked them open again. He stretched, and crossed his arms around himself. He knew his posture communicated that he felt vulnerable, but it was a habit he hadn't been able to train himself out of doing. S.H.I.E.L.D. What would be their game now? The tesseract was found, they didn't need him anymore to track it. Would they just de-brief him and show him the door? Or did they have something less friendly in mind?

He wondered what the army had done with the research on how to stop the Hulk from transforming that they'd confiscated from Mr. Blue during Bruce's last trip to New York. Maybe they'd shared it with S.H.I.E.L.D.

"So, tomorrow, back into the belly of the beast," he muttered.

Cap turned from where he was talking quietly with Tony and gave him an intense look. Ah. Super-soldier hearing at work. Captain America, because Bruce thought that when Steven Rogers wore his uniform, he was every inch Captain America, walked slowly, but with purpose, over to him and laid his hand on his shoulder. He said, "We'll make sure you don't stay there, Doctor Banner. You have my word," and left, saying he wanted to do a quick check of the property damage on this street.

Bruce watched Clint and Natasha whisper together, watched him put his hand on the back of her neck for a long moment, watched her move a little closer, turn and touch him gently on his cheek.

He looked away. Sometimes seeing such small, intimate moments like that reminded him strongly of what he had lost with Betty. There was no going back to those moments, either, except in his memories. And he was too tired and worn out to revisit that shrine tonight.

A low voice broke into his thoughts. "Doctor Banner?" She waited until he recognized her before moving closer, Barton stepping away to give them privacy.

"My PTSD, is it showing?"

"Yes," she said simply, acknowledgment and acceptance in one syllable.

"Call me Bruce, please, Natasha. Or I'll have to start calling you Agent Romanoff."

"Not Miss Romanoff?"

He'd done that to her in that ramshackle house on the edge of Kolkata. Deliberately dissed her, dismissed her status as a highly trained agent under the guise of politeness. Then he'd slammed his hand down on the table and raised his voice.

He'd wanted to see if he could shake her courteous manner, make her show the armored glove without the rose. See if she would show him real honesty, her real intentions. She pointed a gun at him, and the multiple sounds of safeties being taken off guns outside the house had answered that question. S.H.I.E.L.D. hadn't trusted him. It was mutual. He'd opted to do things the easy way, though, banking that if he needed to escape, he'd manage it later. Besides, the tesseract had intrigued him.

And he'd wanted to help, if he could, if the world was in danger.

He'd gone with Agent Romanoff, met the other members of the team Nick Fury had pulled together, and he and Tony had worked together to find the tesseract. And then Loki and his own pain had forced the Hulk to take him over. He knew he'd chased her. He felt bad about that.

Maybe it hadn't been out of respect for any flareups of his PTSD that she'd been so cautious to approach him.

"I'll call you by your title, Agent Romanoff, or your given name, whatever you prefer. I am sorry. I don't want to hurt anybody, including S.H.I.E.L.D. agents."

"Not even ones who use a child to catch you in a trap?"

He shook his head and started to sway on his feet. With difficulty, he made himself stop wavering. Soon, if Tony didn't come and take them to his castle, he was going to fall asleep standing on his feet.

She moved closer to him, cautiously laid a hand on his shoulder. When he didn't jerk away, she came even closer, softly caressed his cheek and then touched his hair. He felt her strong fingers carding through the curls at the back of his neck. It was soothing and something in him melted and he closed his eyes.

"Bruce." She said his name slowly, meaningfully. "My name is Natasha."

The kiss on his temple wasn't unexpected.

When he opened his eyes again, she and Clint were gone.

Tony was there, though, with Thor, and Thor was bending down to peer into his face. He placed both of his heavy hands on Bruce's shoulders and rocked him a little. Bruce staggered, and felt like a small boat in an ocean with big waves.

"Dr. Banner, Eric Selvig, my good friend, speaks highly of you. I wish you well this night and hope that naught troubles your slumber. I go to watch over my brother. Farewell, and know that you hold all the Avengers' gratitude for what you did for Iron Man."

He was gone with a swirl of his cape before Bruce could gather his wandering wits and tell him goodbye.

He yawned three times in a row before he could ask his question. "What... uh, was he talking about? What did the Hulk do for Iron Man?"

Tony's brown eyes widened. "You don't have any memories, not even fractured ones, of the end of the battle?"

"I remember hammering Loki."

Tony snorted. "Puny god."

"Umm... what?"

"It's what the Hulk said about Loki. But Bruce, seriously, you don't remember saving me?"

"Noooo... Later, sometimes I remember things that happened. I never know how much I'm there with the other guy. I only hope I'm doing damage in the right direction when I turn things over to him."

"The other guy."

"Yeah, the other guy. He's... not me." Bruce's fingers were twitching. He rubbed his right thumb over and over in circles on his left palm. He called himself a liar mentally. All that anger? That was him. It flowed through him like blood, like tributaries and rivers, and he kept it all in check until the time was right to open the floodgates.

"You're wrong. He's you, just another facet. He saved me. You saved me." Tony said emphatically.

Maybe Bruce closed his eyes for a second, because suddenly Captain America, tall, strong Steve Rogers, was standing there next to Tony. He must have come in when Thor left, because Bruce had not heard the door open. He caught Bruce's eye and held it.

"Iron Man saved us all. A missile with a nuclear warhead was fired at Manhattan, against Fury's orders, by the way. He gave Tony a heads up, and Tony caught it in flight and steered it up into the hole in the cosmos the Chitauri were pouring from. He blew up the ship that was powering the invaders He almost died. We saw him falling out of the sky right before the gap in space closed. At first, we thought he was all right, since he'd returned. But he wasn't. He was plummeting down and when we realized it, Thor started to wind up his hammer, to attempt a rescue, but Doctor Banner, you were amazing. You jumped up and off buildings and caught Tony. You cushioned his fall, but even so, Tony wasn't breathing after the two of you landed. And then you, the Hulk, roared, and Tony opened his eyes and started breathing again. I'm proud to have fought alongside both of you."

"See, Bruce. Captain America is proud to have fought alongside of you and the Hulk." Tony was grinning. There was a teasing note in his voice, but Bruce was too tired to figure out if it was his chain or Captain America's that Tony was yanking.

"That's very true, but I also meant I'm proud to have _you_ on my team, Tony." Steve smiled at Tony, warm and friendly and welcoming.

Tony looked surprised, and Bruce suddenly wasn't too tired to see that Cap's statement had shot right past all the defenses Tony Stark had ever constructed.

He took pity on Tony and said, "Guys, I'm little tired here. Tony, didn't you promise me a bed?" He grabbed Tony's arm and pulled him out the door. He called behind him, "Captain, good night."

"Actually," Tony said, and stopped Bruce's trek towards where Happy was waiting in the car.

Captain America had caught the door. "Tony asked me to come back with him. But you're right, we're all tired."

"Okay, sure," he told both Tony and Cap. "But I hope you don't expect me to stay awake when we get there."

Cap carefully closed the door after thanking the woman who'd served them for her hospitality, and joined them.

Tony's voice was amused as he switched roles and started pulling Bruce along in his wake to the car, an arm slung around Bruce's shoulders.

"Nope, Doctor Banner. You're excused from socializing any more tonight."

x x x

From far away he heard voices. "_Under two minutes, I totally called it._" and a different one, "_He's exhausted. I don't know how he stayed awake as long as he did._"

x x x

He dreamed then, of a black-haired girl running to show him her sick father and when he came into the home the girl turned around and grew up. She was Natasha, and her hair was bright red. She smoothed back his curls and shot him in the head, but he became the Hulk and handed the bullet to her.

She put the bullet on the table, and he saw they were all sitting eating at the shawarma place, and then Thor stood up and whirled his hammer and it hit Bruce hard, and the Hulk roared as Bruce's clothes ripped to pieces and the Hulk broke through the wall and ran back to Canada and was lost in a blizzard.

Everything was white and he couldn't see. He was so lost but then he wasn't anymore. He was living in a small place up in the Canadian Rockies, and he was doing yoga until it was time to go to work. He opened his cabin door and stepped out into the steamy heat of Brazil. Ross was after him, but his boss needed him to repair the wiring at the bottling plant before he left for Chiapas. People were counting on him, to heal them, to fix their broken stoves and radios.

The dream shifted then, and he knew he was dreaming and what was coming, because he'd dreamed this so many times before but he was helpless to stop it.

Smoke surrounded him and bullets screamed by him, his arm, his skin was on fire and he was bleeding, it hurt, it hurt, and then another bullet grazed his side and he doubled over in pain and he was so angry he wanted to tear their guns from them and throw them far away and yell at them to leave him alone.

Acid was being poured into his brain, and he wanted to scream to make it stop stop stop but he couldn't and then he wasn't Bruce anymore.

He was taken by rage; he was powerful, focused, and in the act of destruction there was such satisfaction. Pleasure coursed through him as he downed the helicopter.

Time leaped, and he was naked and cold near a waterfall in the mountains and Betty was gone. A truck driver gave him a lift and he sat down in the market, rags covering his groin, and he had to sleep, he was so tired, and a child placed some small coins in his hands. He bought food with it, not much, but it was the first time he'd eaten in two days.

The images of Central America rippled, like calm water when a stone is thrown in it, and when it stopped he knew he was in Africa, in Freetown and giving away medicine to patients with malaria and Lassa Fever, but the police arrested him and brought him to New York for not having a medical license for Sierra Leone.

Fury was the judge at his trial and he sentenced Bruce to be blown up by a nuke. He was tricked into going to sleep and Iron Man flew him out to an abandoned Navy carrier, and put his dead mother's crucifix in his hand. Iron Man was sad, but Bruce had hurt so many people that he needed to be put down. The nuke didn't kill him though; he woke up in time and transformed into the Hulk and got away but he was caught again and this time he was given to Ross because he belonged to the Army, his body was an army weapon and …

He was being shaken, and he came out of his dreams long enough to realize he'd fallen asleep in a car.

"It's okay, Bruce. Just a nightmare, go back to sleep." Tony was here. He relaxed and the nightmare faded. Within seconds he felt himself slipping under into dreamland.

He woke up enough to realize someone was carrying him.

"Wha..."

"You're okay. Cap's got you."

He closed his eyes and then he was on a bed and his shoes and clothes were being pulled off and the air felt cool on his skin, until a blanket covered him.

The last thing he was dimly aware of was someone stroking his hair.

And then welcome, dreamless, bottomless sleep claimed him.

x x x


	2. Natasha

**Natasha**

"Doctor Banner, please wake up. Mr. Stark insists. You'll find clean clothes ready for you, and he asks that you join him in the kitchen in fifteen minutes. Doctor Banner, I'm terribly sorry to disturb you, but Mr. Stark insists you must wake up now. You'll find clean clothes on the dresser and he asks that you join him in the kitchen in fifteen minutes. He promises coffee. Doctor Banner, it's urgent that you join Mr. Stark-"

"M'wake." Bruce tumbled out of bed and stretched.

The disembodied voice sounded cultured, with a British inflection. Tony's AI. He'd read articles about Tony Stark's innovative work and JARVIS. His demon curiosity flared up, and he had to clamp down hard on it. He wasn't sticking around for more than another day or two, he didn't have the time to probe and read research and ask Tony questions about his advances in robotics and artificial intelligence.

"Ah... I slept how long?"

"You slept twenty hours, seventeen minutes and fifty-five seconds. You awoke once, drank 1.75 liters of water, and spent four minutes in the facilities. I've informed Mr. Stark that you're awake, and he apologizes, but Director Fury is insisting on your attendance."

"Is he now? Ummm... JARVIS, are there any S.H.I.E.L.D agents on the premises?"

"Yes, sir. However, Mr. Stark requests that you not worry about it. I quote, 'Everything is cool.'"

Bruce picked up the black jeans and button-down green shirt, boxers and socks, and went into the bathroom.

"Tell him, he'd better be right."

x x x

He'd closed his eyes briefly before trying to open his door, calming his fear that he'd been locked into this room. Tony wouldn't do that. He knew that and still he had this gut reaction. It was ridiculous. Tony had been honest with him, there was no deep game being played here.

Tony delighted in bouncing ideas off him, and had been as open about wanting to play together in a science wonderland as two campers meeting each other and hitting it off for a summer chock full of fun. And he was okay with that for the time being. Camp ended though, and everybody went home, taking with them some swell memories. Maybe a few souvenirs, and promises to write each other that were forgotten when they returned to their normal routine.

He didn't expect to keep in touch with Tony after he moved on. Tony would be distracted by newer, shinier things than one guy on the run.

The door opened easily, and JARVIS gave him directions to a kitchen, where Tony was pouring coffee into a travel mug.

"Hey, sorry, but Fury's snit is approaching DEFCON 1." He thrust the mug into Bruce's hands. "We'll get you something to eat at S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters. Or maybe send out for pizza. I bet the rest of the team would go for a pizza. Did I mention that Fury preferred you go to the Times Square office and not the helicarrier? Can't imagine why."

"Snit?" Bruce asked, ignoring Tony's alluding to the destruction the other guy had done on the helicarrier. He sipped his coffee, following Tony as they headed towards an elevator.

"That we let you sleep. He'll get over it." Tony talked about everything and nothing as they made their way to the garage level. Natasha was waiting for them when they exited the elevator.

"Bruce." She smiled slightly at him, and her voice warmed a bit. "Did you forget to brush your hair?"

He shrugged. He hadn't forgotten, but with no brush or comb in the bathroom he'd just finger combed it after his shower. At least there'd been a toothbrush and a razor.

Tony, with no regard for personal space or dignity, tugged at Bruce's curls and ran his hand through Bruce's hair. A memory of the night before surfaced, this same hand touching his hair as he fell asleep.

Tony said, "Now this just fascinates me. Your hair grows a lot faster after you've hulked out, doesn't it? I noticed it last night, and I referenced your appearance on the helicarrier for comparison. Your metabolism is a thing of beauty. I'm right, aren't I?"

He shrugged again and gently removed Tony's curious fingers from his hair. Tony made an impatient gesture with his hands and Bruce caved. He mumbled, "Yeah, it grows faster, but my hair always was curly."

He glanced at Natasha. There was a hint of a larger smile playing at one corner of her mouth.

Bruce muttered, "So this is what you superheroes talk about when you're not saving the world? Hair?"

Natasha answered, "Stark's probably in it for the science. I just think your tousled look is cute."

"Not just for science," Tony objected. He took Bruce's coffee from him, sipped it, then handed it back. He shot Bruce a playful look. "The Avengers took a vote on sexiest hair style of team members while you were sleeping. Cap abstained. You and Thor tied. Flowing locks versus wild sexy bedhead curls. I voted for you, Doctor Banner."

Bruce felt himself flushing, flustered by the two of them teasing him. This wasn't fair. He was allowed to appreciate Natasha's whole leather jumpsuit and sex style of dressing, her bright red hair, and Tony's confident sexiness, his energy and charm, his wit, because Bruce was keeping it to _himself._ It was just for him, and didn't impinge on them at all. None of the Avengers could read minds, could they? He didn't think so, so nobody would know he was attracted to some of his team members.

They shouldn't tell him he was cute or run fingers through his hair because they thought his curls were sexy. It was just hair and... "I vote for Thor. Can we go now?" Well, that sounded more plaintive then he'd intended. Tony grinned the whole way to S.H.I.E.L.D.'s Manhattan office.

x x x

Bruce decided that since she'd stayed after the other agents had left this interrogation room, Natasha must still be assigned as his handler. Or more accurately, his keeper. Lucky Natasha. He wondered if she had nightmares about the Hulk trying to rip her in two. Would she stop him from leaving?

He stood up and stretched. He was still tired, despite practically sleeping for a day. He'd worked hard as the other guy, and there was a corresponding downtime afterwards. He glanced at the door and drifted closer to it, arms low and tucked close to his body, a hand on his other wrist.

Natasha didn't say anything, but he felt the weight of her eyes on him. She had been standing near the door since ushering the other agents out of the room, her stance relaxed but alert.

It was still unclear what S.H.I.E.L.D. wanted from him. It wasn't like the world needed to be saved from an alien invasion every day.

He'd answered all the questions he deemed might be useful in case of further attacks by aliens, and deflected the ones he thought were dangerous to his continued freedom and well-being. He wasn't about to hand over insights into how the Hulk might be controlled, or unleashed.

Unfortunately, the effects of the increase in gamma radiation from Loki's scepter were well documented by now.

It made him feel queasy to know that he could be forced to transform again, that he might fail at controlling himself as he'd failed on the helicarrier.

He frowned, and Natasha noticed. He couldn't read her, not really. Was he making her nervous when he seemed to not be a happy camper, or was that just what she wanted him to think?

Maybe she was playing him, seeing if he'd try to intimidate her again, give him enough rope to hang himself and show that he was a loose cannon, to prove that he needed to be controlled for everyone else's safety.

Maybe he was being a dick, thinking about frightening another human being because it made him feel powerful, em_safe_/em to know she'd step back from him, keep away and not attack him. Hopefully just leave him alone.

Maybe he'd traumatized her, a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent trained to withstand torture, and he could chalk that up on the loss side of his score card.

He'd been in control for over a year, with no incidents, and then she had come to Kolkata. He'd felt trapped and he'd wanted to share that feeling with her.

Yeah, he was a dick. He couldn't control her actions, but he could damn well control his own. He swallowed down his discomfort and made eye contact with her.

"Natasha, I can control it, as long as nobody tries to torture me too badly, or exposes me to gamma radiation. I've been beaten up. I've had everything I owned stolen from me, and I stayed me. I've learned how to let the anger simmer, but not boil over. I'm not going to hurt you."

She gave him one of those steely-eyed looks. Threat assessing, maybe. He made himself go and sit down and laid his hands palm up, open, not clenched, on his knees. Maybe she'd believe him, probably not. But he had concerns and they weren't about himself.

"Steven Rogers, he has to be protected from being turned into a lab experiment. It's important, his blood, his cells, Ross would love to get his hands on Captain America. He doesn't deserve that, so, uh... can the Avengers protect him? Ross lies. He lied to me, and he was responsible for Blonski becoming the Abomination. S.H.I.E.L.D.? I don't know how ruthless your science guys are, but the same goes for them."

He crossed his arms around himself and looked away. Did he trust Natasha to tell Captain America what he'd told her, to warn him? Maybe he'd have a chance to talk to Steve himself. Maybe, now that his debriefing was over, S.H.I.E.L.D. would get rough with him. He wondered if there was another supposedly Hulk proof room in this facility. He really didn't want to leave a mess when he left, but he wasn't going in a cage.

Natasha sighed. Without really wanting to, his eyes found hers. "_Bozhe moi_. Bruce... Steven Rogers is safe. So are you. I swear to it. You're thinking, are you not, that you might have to escape from S.H.I.E.L.D.? Maybe it's time to stop running. What is it children say on the playground? If you can't beat them, join them? The Avengers want you, Bruce."

"What does S.H.I.E.L.D. want from me? Is that promise you made that I could walk away once the tesseract was found going to be kept?"

She walked over to him. "I'll keep my word. Right now, you're still needed in case there are more problems with the tesseract. But you are an incredible asset, Bruce. S.H.I.E.L.D. doesn't want to fight you, even if you don't come to some agreement with Fury."

Bruce didn't say anything. The silence between them grew heavy.

Natasha broke first and said, "No secrets, okay? Would you like to read your file? And Agent Barton, he was one of your watchers. He said he'd talk with you about your surveillance. I'll set it up, if you like." She waited, patient, till he nodded.

"I'm hungry, and we were promised pizza. Let's call in an order to Patzeria's and tell the others to pick it up and join us." She came close and extended a hand.

She was beautiful and he wasn't immune to her. He stifled an impulse to take her hand and kiss each finger, run his hands along her arms and caress her breasts, kiss her mouth and see if she tasted of fear or desire. He wouldn't do any of those things. He wouldn't hand her a key to twisting him around any more than she already was capable of doing or muddy things between them.

"Bruce. You trusted me when we fought against Loki. Trust me now. It's going to be all right."

He took her hand and she pulled him up. She was strong and he knew she'd been instrumental in stopping the invasion. And he owed her something. He'd stay a little longer. He'd read his file. Maybe at least it would point out to him what he should do differently if he left.

He smiled at her, a little diffidently, and said, "Make one of the pizzas vegetarian, please?"

x x x


	3. Clint

Author's notes (late, sorry. I forgot to post them with the first chapter)

My gratitude and thanks go to Caarianna, T. Verano, Sparrowhawk17, and Wneleh for their excellent beta assistance. From spotting grammar mistakes, to taking a squint-eyed look at the comic book science lingo, to discussing the characters, they've been a ton of help.

The line "Firemen stay at the Firehouse" was borrowed from Wasp, from Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, and one of Bruce's dreams originated from the Ultimates comic book story line.

In this story, Bruce is both a MD and a Ph.D.

**Clint**

"That painting? Pretty sure it has a twin in a conference room at Culver University," Bruce pointed out. In fact, S.H.I.E.L.D.'s group meeting room seemed to be a clone of the boring basement room in Culver's biophysics building.

Bruce walked around the perimeter of this room Natasha had escorted him to, stopping at the coffee machine set up on the small hospitality cart. He hesitated, his paranoia kicking up again. What if the coffee was drugged? Why this room?

Natasha left her place by the doorway, and he thought she moved like a dancer, like a gymnast, (like an assassin.) She filled a styrofoam cup to the brim, sipped it down a little, and handed it to him.

"Am I wrong, to be so... careful?" Their eyes met and he wondered what his own were giving away to her.

"Being careful is never wrong, Doctor Banner. In fact, I think any agents who are assigned to you would appreciate it if you could be a little more careful. You have a way of falling right into trouble, Bruce."

He arched his eyebrows at that statement.

She quirked hers up in reply. "I read all of your file on the way to Kolkata. You don't, as they say, have a leg to stand on."

"I don't go looking for trouble." He tried, he really tried, to keep a low profile while he moved from place to place.

Her expression warring between a trace of a smile and skepticism, she said, "It's adorable that you think that. Bruce, you can't seem to help yourself. All the people you tried to help, it's all in writing."

Embarrassed, he leaned against the wall and hoped she'd drop the conversation. He drank his coffee slowly. He needed the caffeine. And he was hungry. His stomach growled, and Natasha looked amused for a brief moment. He had a sudden flashback of her looking terrified at him instead.

"The pizzas and the team will be arriving soon. Agent Barton is bringing a copy of your file and should be here any minute. A paper copy. You're not cleared to use any of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s computers."

The door opened and Hawkeye – everybody had such dramatic nicknames, Black Widow, Captain America, Iron Man - walked in, a thick file in his hand. He went to Natasha and Bruce was reminded again of what he'd seen in that little shawarma place. A quick touch and eye contact between them, and Natasha nodded.

Clint said softly, but Bruce heard him clearly enough, "He's awake. Go and see him, Tasha."

She glanced at Bruce and he gave her a little wave of his fingers.

"Save me some of the pizza, Bruce. Don't let Clint and Thor eat it all."

She left, and Bruce studied his new babysitter.

Barton had his gear with him, ready to be used, Bruce supposed, in case of some kind of attack. He was curious about the archer's trick arrows. Maybe Tony had engineered them. He wondered what else S.H.I.E.L.D. agents did when they weren't saving the world or following him around. They'd all seemed very involved and serious and busy on the helicarrier. Well, except for the guy who'd been playing video games instead of tracking what he was supposed to be watching. Tony had spotted him. It had been funny and had made him feel a little more relaxed since he'd had proof that S.H.I.E.L.D. agents were capable of acting like human beings after all.

Barton put the file down near Bruce and hopped up on the table to sit cross-legged, far enough away from Bruce that there was no danger of encroaching on his personal space. Bruce wasn't sure if that was to make him feel comfortable or for Barton's peace of mind.

Bruce threw away the empty cup and slid into a seat. He opened the file and squinted a little – he had no idea what had happened to his glasses – and read the first page. Mostly it was photos and demographics – his birth-date; that he'd been born in Dayton, Ohio; employment history before the accident; and a list of jobs he'd worked as he'd fled from country to country.

He paused to touch the names of some of the restaurants or places where he'd been employed as a undocumented day laborer, doing just about anything – plumbing, electrical work, digging ditches, gardening - and remembered some of the people he'd worked alongside of over the years. Marta's baby would be starting school now, and Jimmy and Gina would have celebrated their third wedding anniversary. Jason and Enrique, Sally and Maria, they were all people he'd found some comfort with, although he turned down their offers of sex. He just couldn't take the risk of elevating his pulse. Two hundred heartbeats a minute was a physical threshold for involuntary transformation.

Barton was playing with a pen and watching him closely, he realized, and Bruce shot him a wry smile.

"Just taking a trip down memory lane," Bruce reassured him and turned his attention to the rest of the page.

Of course, his educational record, including his graduation from Harvard Summa Cum Laude from the MD/PhD program in Health Sciences &Technology and Biophysics, was there. Harvard was where he'd met Betty; they'd both volunteered as test subjects for an experiment in hallucinations. Those had been good times, aside from the whole melting your brain experience. Fury had added a personal note that Banner had always had a tendency towards self-experimentation.

S.H.I.E.L.D. had listed his known aliases, including his current ones. He'd have to rustle up some new ones.

The height and weight section included a notation that his weight tended to fluctuate depending on his resources.

He looked at Barton, a little incredulous. "So... I lose ten pounds when I'm broke and _that_ gets added to my file?"

"Sure, Doc. Anything and everything, it all goes in the paperwork."

"Agent Romanoff, she said you used to tail me?"

"For nine weeks. You were hanging around in Guatemala before you left on that medical charity boat to Sierra Leone." Barton grinned, and his stoic features transformed into something a lot more mischievous. "Won a bet on your love life while I was assigned to you, Doc. Sucks to be you, though."

"I... what love life?"

"That was the point, genius. Oh, you'll smile and be nice to them, and the boys and girls get all dewy-eyed, but kissing is as far as you go." Barton flipped the pen into the air and caught it again. "You kiss'em usually ten minutes before you're out the door and off to a new place."

Bruce felt like rolling his eyes. He supposed this was another sort of test, to see if he could handle teasing without getting moody and hulking out. If he could tolerate Tony Stark jabbing pointy things in his side to see if his eyes would turn green, he could handle one mouthy S.H.I.E.L.D. agent.

Bruce studied his fingers. "Just practicing safe sex. By which I mean it's safer if I don't have sex. How much did you win?"

"Two hundred bucks."

Bruce felt his eyebrows go up. "You owe me at least a beer, Hawkeye. Maybe some nachos to go with it."

"Decide to stick around, and I'll pay up, Doc." Barton grinned at him again, and Bruce decided he didn't want to know if there were any current pools being run on his staying or leaving.

"Mm-hm. And I bet that you were sent to tag after me as a punishment detail. What'd you do to annoy Fury?"

Barton laughed outright. "It's classified. Commit to being an Avenger, sign the paperwork, and I'll tell you."

Bruce made a non-committal sound and began speed-reading through the documents. The earliest ones were copies of army records. The disastrous experiment was documented, the damage and bodily injury he'd done as the Hulk, the people killed as he'd shattered the building, a notation that his research, and Betty's, had been appropriated from Culver University. Psychological profile. Family history. An email to Betty that Ross had intercepted in February of 2006. Interviews with witnesses across the US and in other countries who'd had interactions with Bruce Banner or the Hulk. Reports of attempts to trap him, and estimates of his abilities. An inventory of lab equipment and notes left in the rooms he'd had to abandon. Property damage and casualty lists.

He paused after reading the report on two hunters he was believed to have killed in Canada.

Shaking his head, he said, "No. That couple in Canada, three years ago? That was not me. I called the authorities and told them where the bodies were, but they were dead when I got there."

"Okay, Doctor Banner. Duly noted." Bruce took a few moments to regulate his breathing. Hawkeye had sounded a little too soothing when he'd replied. Bruce wasn't anywhere close to losing it, but there was no need to panic his babysitter.

Ross had gotten close to catching him several times, and he frowned when he read how he'd been traced to the bottling plant in Brazil. That cut on his finger. His damn blood had gotten in a bottle after all, and some man had been hospitalized because of gamma poisoning. It had tripped a flag in the system and he'd had to leave his dog and run for it. He hoped the dog had survived. The army had gotten his laptop, and there were printouts of all his emails to Mr. Blue. That was how he'd been tracked down by General Ross the last time he'd come to New York.

After the fight in Harlem, though, S.H.I.E.L.D. had been in charge of searching for him, not the army. Ross hadn't been happy about the hand-off, according to the terse emails fired off to Fury in his file. He didn't agree with Fury placing Bruce on Threat Level Red, surveillance only. S.H.I.E.L.D. had rescinded his status as an alleged domestic terrorist, too.

S.H.I.E.L.D. had given him a codename when they'd taken over. It fit, he supposed, to be given the name of the first man who'd lost control of his anger and killed. Cain had been condemned to wander the earth, and be shunned by others. He remembered part of a quote from the bible, "A fugitive and a vagabond thou shalt be." A little over-dramatic, but a correct assessment of his past and his future.

He closed the file and pushed it across the table to Barton. "I'm done." He kept his voice soft, neutral. The truth was the truth; he'd learned to live with it.

"You didn't finish it." Barton accurately opened the file to the last document Bruce had read. "What did you read? You just – shut down."

"I've seen enough. Oh, and S.H.I.E.L.D. spelled my codename wrong. It's C-a-i-n. You know, I'm not really hungry. I'll skip the pizza. Think I'll walk back to Tony's place."

"Doctor Banner, are you all right? Want to take some deep breaths?"

Barton thought he was getting upset. He wasn't. He'd made sure to not raise his voice or clench his fists. The other guy wasn't going to show up. Not yet.

"What's going to happen, Agent Barton, when I leave this room, this building? Am I in custody, or are you guys going to start following me around again?"

All those years of running, fruitlessly trying to find a cure. He could feel his heart start to pound in his chest. Anger, the child of fear, rose in him at the thought of being hounded, pursued.

He got up fast, but his new keeper had been faster. He found an arrow was aimed straight at him, and Barton was blocking the door.

"It won't hurt you, but it will knock you out. Don't make me use it, Doc. You can leave later, when you calm down."

"The other guy will show up before any sedative takes hold, if I know I'm being drugged. I, ah, thought I'd do myself and the world a favor a while ago and check out, but it didn't work. Don't make me angry, Barton. Just let me leave now. New York's been beat up enough, don't you think?" Bruce had spoken in a perfectly reasonable tone of voice, but Barton was still pointing that arrow at him.

"Thought the deal with anger management was knowing that nobody can make you feel angry, only you can decide how to feel, how to react. Yeah, I've had some classes. What? You think you're the only one who ever smashed stuff up when he got ticked off?" Barton's eyes flicked toward the chair Bruce had abandoned. "Let's sit down and talk for a minute, okay, Doc? Do that, and I'll put this away. Prove to me that you can stay settled down and I'll walk you out of here."

Narrowing his eyes, Bruce weighed what Barton had said as the seconds ticked by, then he closed his eyes for a moment and let the tension slide out of his body. He sighed, then did as Barton had asked and sat back down, put his hands on the table. Barton lowered his bow, put the arrow in his quiver, and pulled up a chair several seats away from Bruce. Waiting for Barton to decide that he wasn't in danger of hulking out, Bruce stared at his hands, willing them to behave and not fidget.

"You think we nicknamed you after the guy who murdered his brother in the Bible, don't you?"

"Didn't you? It fits." Barton looked at him sharply, and Bruce wanted to reel in the sound of his own voice, because, yeah, that bitter note was not neutral. He strived for neutral.

Barton leaned forward. "Look, the agent in charge who came up with that name back when S.H.I.E.L.D. got your case is a giant nerd, all right? And he'd already spent a lot of time interviewing people who you'd helped and some who helped you when you changed from being the Hulk. And then there was the meditation you learned how to do, and those beginner classes you took in martial arts. Also? The shoes issue. You did a lot of manual work, not to mention the doctoring you did. And you're wandering around all the time. Let's not forget that part."

Bruce massaged his temples for a moment or two before laying his hands back down, sure that the headache that was creeping around the corner would make a full-blown entrance within seconds.

"My shoes?"

"Lack of shoes. You'd turn big and green, bust your shoes up, and end up barefoot. So, we got a soft-spoken, barefoot guy with Zen kind of thinking, who meditates and works hard at mostly lousy jobs, wandering from place to place, dead broke usually. A healer, who's been known to flip somebody over his shoulder once in a while." Barton gave him a wicked grin and widened his eyes. He looked like he was daring Bruce to make a guess about whose name they'd given him.

Bruce gave up keeping his hands still and scrubbed them over his face. "Oh, you have got to be kidding me."

"C-a-i-n- -_e_. Kwai Chang Caine. See the resemblance? We didn't forget how dangerous you can be, Doc. But it was pretty clear that you weren't trying to terrorize anybody, except when Ross tried to capture you or you landed in a very bad situation."

His muscles had tensed up again, but he relaxed them after Barton said that ridiculous analogy. Starting to wonder just how screwy you had to be to qualify as a S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent, he protested, "I don't have a tiger or dragon branded on my arms, you know. I'm not a Shaolin priest. I'm a very lapsed Catholic."

He pointed a finger at Barton. "And you know what? Forget buying me _one_ beer, I think you owe me a six-pack, on behalf of all those other agents with too much time on their hands doing surveillance on me."

Barton chuckled. "Doc, we never had a spare minute. Between the attention from Hydra and those drug dealers in Puerto Barrios, not to mention just generally getting in the middle of feuds, you were high maintenance."

Bruce reluctantly smiled at him. "Sorry." He bit his lip and slid his hands under the table, hiding them, so he could twist them together.

The impulse to run that had flooded through him earlier was gone. He was reckless, he knew that, but there would be a better time to leave. S.H.I.E.L.D. was at least giving him a long leash. He'd find the right time to slip it.

"Am I a prisoner?" He said it quietly, watching Barton's eyes.

"No." Barton got up from his chair and moved right next to Bruce, sitting down on the table, legs dangling over the side. He nudged Bruce with his foot. "I meant what I said. I'll walk you out of here when we're done with this conversation, if that's what you really want to do. But Fury doesn't think you should be out on your own right now. And in my opinion, and I do have one, Fury is still assessing you and what you could bring to the Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D. He's deciding if the benefits outweigh the costs. He doesn't want to track you down half-way across the world while he figures this out, that's why he's asking – nicely for Fury – if you would stay the hell put. Camp out at Stark's place. Keep Tony Stark busy playing science bros with you and out of Fury's imaginary hair, and he'd probably hire you for that reason alone."

"So you would have knocked me out for my own good?" Bruce said slowly, looking up at Barton.

"Yeah. There's already a precedent for the team. Ask Natasha sometime if she'll tell you about it," Barton said.

"I'll meditate on it. Remember the lessons from my masters."

"Grasshopper, using sarcasm like that will help you fit right in around here. Stick with us, Doc. I think the Avengers could do some good together."

"Ah. 'Don't think about where you have come from, or where you will go; the one is not so good and the other you may not want to know.' And that's your Zen for today." He said it out loud to amuse Barton, but actually it was something he told himself often.

"Coulson is going to love hearing that you said something Zen." Barton was snickering.

"He's alive? He's the giant nerd?"

"Yeah. He made it. It was close, though." Barton's expression had changed and gone very flat.

"Tony told me that Fury said he'd died." Fury would lie, then. Bruce would remember that.

"Fury is a 'the means justifies the end' kind of guy."

"I'm a little surprised he let me see my file," Bruce said.

"He didn't. Team decision. Natasha and I talked it over with Cap, and Tony and Thor gave it a thumbs up."

Bruce felt his breath go a little ragged and he didn't know why. He was spared thinking it through by the arrival of Tony and Thor carrying between them seven boxes of large pizzas, and Steve Rogers hefting a large cooler through the doorway and setting it on the table.

Clint jumped up and rooted through the cooler, then handed Bruce a Dos Equis.

"Cheers, Kwai Chang."

Steve looked at him and Clint oddly, and then shook his head. "What was it this time, a movie, book, historical figure?"

Clint pulled out another Dos Equis and clinked it against Bruce's. "Old TV show called Kung Fu. We can catch some episodes some time, cause they're great. We'll make Bruce watch them with us."

Rolling his eyes, because he couldn't resist doing it any longer, Bruce decided that Coulson wasn't the only nerd in S.H.I.E.L.D.

He'd finished two beers and three slices of pizza by the time Natasha joined them. He silently handed her the rest of the box he'd been guarding from the others.

She touched his arm. "Thank you." The smile on her face was reserved, but he thought it was genuine.

Then again, she was a master at her work. Clint wasn't bad either.

Hawkeye had been talkative, friendly, teasing, even if he had been prepared to tranquilize Bruce, and that behavior seemed at odds with the quiet, intense, and vigilant man he'd appeared to be when Bruce had first met him.

Being nice, that could be an act, to lull him into cooperating. But maybe Clint Barton was this way when he wasn't on a mission. It sounded like Clint considered himself an Avenger, and accepted the others as his teammates. Or he wanted Bruce to think that, anyway. He and Natasha were still S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, though, and which way would they jump if the Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D. disagreed with each other? If Fury ordered them to take him down? Well, they couldn't, but he didn't like that they could have divided loyalties over him.

He decided that people were complicated. Dogs were simple, and he missed the stray he'd taken care of when he lived in Rocinha. He hoped someone in the favela had taken him in.

Bruce didn't really talk to anybody as they sat around the table and ate. They talked to him, though, and he listened to the stories and jokes. He was full of pizza and beer and tired and being with this group of people was starting to feel comfortable.

That was dangerous.

The other five had become intertwined. He could see it in their body language and voice tone. And him. He felt that connection, too, as much as he kept trying to ease himself back to being an outsider. They'd become... comrades, the bonds between them forged in battle. Probably that feeling would fade, after a time. These people were all strong individuals with strong opinions. There was bound to be clashes in the future between them, after all.

He did finally ask something he'd been wondering about, after he'd talked privately to Steve about not agreeing to play lab rat for anybody, but especially not for General Ross.

"Did, ah, all of you sign up for future Avengers duty?" He thought they had, from the conversations he'd been listening to, but it was best not to assume.

"Yes, but Clint and I will work with S.H.I.E.L.D. on other assignments when we're not needed for the team," Natasha said. Clint nodded in agreement.

"Avengers, yes. S.H.I.E.L.D. as a consultant, yes. Jumping whenever Fury says to hop to it – no. Sorry, Captain. I'm still not a soldier." Tony raised his beer in a toast – to himself? "But Cap, you call the Avengers to assemble for a mission and I'll be there."

Steve said, "Thank you, Tony. You know, the Army declared me dead a long time ago, when they changed my classification from missing in action to killed in action. That ended my stint, and I'm not re-enlisting. I took the assignment from S.H.I.E.L.D. to be the team leader of the Avengers, and I intend to keep it. But I'd like a chance to go on leave. I saw a lot of the states and Europe when the Army assigned me to do PR work, but there wasn't time to really take in the sights. Just do a show, and travel to the next town. In battle, you can't really focus on scenic views. I was just a kid from Brooklyn before I went into the Army. I'd only been up to the city or to New Jersey before."

He turned to Bruce. "You've traveled a lot, Doctor Banner. Maybe we could talk sometime about places you've been that I might like to see. I have a motorcycle. How did you travel usually?"

Bruce held up his thumb. "With this, mostly. And I walked a lot. Sometimes I could afford buses, or boats. I've used snowshoes in Canada. I avoided planes; too much security. I have seen some beautiful sights, rainforests and mountains, glaciers."

Thor said, "Midgard indeed is a lovely world. It has changed much since the Jotunheim fought to own it, many years ago, but it is still breathtaking. I wonder that the people of Earth do not take better care of this jewel, though."

"Green energy – that's the way to go. Stark Tower is totally powered by arc reactor tech. Bruce, wait till I show you around and you see the labs, you're going to love it. Tonight, okay?" Tony sounded eager, and Bruce didn't want to disappoint him but he knew himself well enough after all the times he'd transformed to know he'd have to crash soon.

"If I'm not too wiped out. Sorry," Bruce said apologetically. "Blame the other guy."

"I, too, have pledged my protection to Midgard and if I can I will stand with the Avengers to battle any foes that threaten this world. And my friends, I ask your indulgence. Tomorrow morning I will take Loki home to Asgard. Your council, Nick Fury has informed me, have agreed to let Odin punish Loki for his crimes against the people of Midgard. The tesseract will power our return, and be safely kept in Asgard. Odin has pledged it. It would be fitting if those who defeated Loki stood witness for your fair world that Loki has been returned to Asgard for judgment. As for myself, I would find great comfort in your company."

Bruce decided he'd stay. Thor had not talked about his brother to Bruce, or to any of them, he thought. He didn't want to tell Thor that he once had a mother, until his father had killed her, and that even so, a part of him had continued to love his father, and mourned him when he'd died. Thor loved his brother, and when he looked out at Bruce tomorrow, Loki his prisoner, Bruce thought that instead of seeing hate directed at Loki, Thor should see understanding instead.

x x x


	4. Thor

**Thor**

Late in the evening, before he and Tony had left the others in the nondescript lobby of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s mid Manhattan office, Clint had given him a light punch on his bicep and Natasha another small touch on his arm. Steve had laid a hand on his shoulder, and Thor had clapped him on the back. Bruce was a little startled about all of that. Sometimes he went for weeks without another human being touching him. Sometimes he said goodbye to new-made friends with a kiss and a hug to indulge himself, to steal away a memory to savor.

He told Tony they'd better do the tour of the labs tomorrow. Tony hadn't even argued about that, so he must look as tired as he felt. Plus, he was kind of a lightweight when it came to alcohol. It was one of the reasons that he rarely drank, despite his demanding beer from Clint as his cut of that silly bet about his sex life. That had been... what? Indulging in a little fun with a teammate? He didn't know. It had been a long time since he'd been part of a group, and he was rusty at it.

Two beers wasn't going to even start to get him drunk, but they loosened him up, made him feel a little sleepy.

Being a lightweight wasn't the only reason why he didn't drink much. The real reason? He feared the ghost of his father might possess him if he became too drunk. He remembered the sequence so well. Cause and effect, and the budding scientist in him had taken careful notes. Chug the beer, gulp the whiskey, then rage through the house, destroy things, hurt people. Kill people.

"C'mon, big guy. Happy's waiting." Tony slung his arm around him and steered him towards the car. Tony, he decided, was just very tactile. He wouldn't read anything more into these gestures than that. He let Tony keep touching him, though. It would make a good memory.

x x x

In the end, there was little to say to Thor before he and Loki departed the next morning. Thor was sad and grim. Even Tony had been subdued, respecting Thor's anguish over his brother's fate.

Thor had clasped arms with each of the other Avengers, and he'd said quiet words to each of them. Then he escorted Loki to the place of departure, while the Avengers stood as the just witnesses for the Earth.

To Bruce, he had said should the Hulk wish to spar, he would be most glad to oblige him. He thanked him once again for joining in the battle, and expressed his utmost desire that Bruce continue to be an Avenger. Bruce made a non-committal sound and Thor took him by the shoulders.

"My brother forced your mighty warrior free without your consent or guidance, and I shall carry your grievance to Odin. He will judge Loki. I am sorry for the harm he did to you, and I shall pay any price you ask, in Loki's name."

Bruce's gut clenched when he looked up at Thor. He hated talking about his father, but he would. He thought that Thor needed him to do this.

"I don't hold you responsible for your brother, Thor. And, um, listen. I've got some experience with this. Somebody you love, family, they do something awful, terrible, and you're angry with them and disappointed and sad and maybe even scared of them, but sometimes, you still love them. Maybe you hate them, too, at times, but the love for them, it's still there. It's, ah, okay if you feel that way."

Thor's eyes were really very, very blue. Looking intently at Bruce a moment longer, he drew him into a rib-cracking hug that lifted him off the ground. Thor set him down and Bruce felt himself redden, discomfited for a moment.

"You are wise, my friend, and I shall remember your words of comfort. Fare thee well till I return to Midgard." He grasped Bruce's arm in a warriors clasp for a long moment.

Loki, subdued and silenced, took his place with his brother and together, hands on the tesseract's new casing, they were gone. Loki was no longer the Avengers' problem. The tesseract was no longer S.H.I.E.L.D.'s concern. His agreement with Fury was completed.

He caught Natasha's eye and she took him away from the milling crowd.

"If S.H.I.E.L.D. is done snooping through my backpack, can I have it back? I could use a few shirts, my other pair of pants. The few bucks I had in a side pocket, too."

He'd had some money in his trousers when Natasha had found him. Of course, that had been lost when he'd transformed into the Hulk on the helicarrier.

"We can buy you anything you need, give you money," Natasha said, carefully.

"Mmmmm. No. I think I don't want to feel... obligated to S.H.I.E.L.D."

"You're really very stubborn, Doctor Banner."

"You already knew that, Agent Romanoff. You read my file."

She touched him on his arm, a light caress that seemed to have become routine between them, and left.

x x x


	5. Steve

**Steve**

"Stark, Doctor Banner. Fury's ordered us to meet with him at the Manhattan office."

Steve had caught up to them as they headed towards Tony's convertible, intending to return to Stark Tower so Tony could finally give Bruce the R & D tour.

Candyland, he'd called it on the helicarrier. Bruce was caught up on sleep, and more than ready to be dazzled by Tony's toys. And his brilliance. If he left, he would miss the way they tossed ideas and concepts back and forth and just sparked off each other.

"What's up, Captain? Trouble?" Tony would like that, Bruce thought. To be Iron Man. Save the day, rescue people, protect the city.

"No. No new trouble. But he said it was important."

Steve turned to Bruce. "Doctor Banner, he said you'd have safe passage."

Bruce ran his hand through his hair and said skeptically, "Fury said that?"

Tony crossed his arms. "Yeah, that's not really his style." He eyed Steve. "You insisted, right? Of course you did. Good idea, Cap."

Steve looked at Bruce, and the sincerity, the protectiveness, in that look made Bruce feel odd. Since the accident, he'd sometimes swapped protection for his labor, physical or mental. Other times, he'd used the oldest currency known, and bartered his body. He'd given blowjobs or let himself be fucked when he'd been beyond desperate. It was safe; he didn't like those men, wasn't turned on by them, and his heartbeat stayed steady as he serviced them.

The last person to protect him unselfishly had been Betty. For a reward, he'd dragged her into his world. He'd regretted that so much. When he'd kissed her before letting himself fall out of the helicopter to fight Blonski, he'd been saying goodbye. He had no intention of disrupting her life again, making her a fugitive with him.

It was pointless for Bruce to ask Steve why he was looking out for him. He already knew.

Bruce had sometimes wished he was Captain America, brave and strong and good, when he'd been a kid. But the bastardized super-soldier serum had made him the Hulk, instead. He knew what that said about him.

"Doctor Banner?" Steve's eyes were kind now.

Tony bumped his shoulder and Bruce said, "All right. This time I'll come." Then he noticed Steve observing the way Bruce kept moving his right thumb back and forth across his left wrist, and he put his hands in his pockets, hiding them.

Steve said, "Thank you, Doctor."

"Steve? Call me Bruce? If you want to, that is," Bruce said, disconcerted by the way Steve had focused on his fidgeting.

"I like calling you by your title. It's respectful. Is that okay?" Steve said calmly.

Tony snorted. "Sure, Cap." He wrapped an arm around Bruce's waist and said, "Let's go, Big Green. See you there, Captain." He steered them towards the parking lot, and Bruce let him, enjoying the feel of Tony's arm against his back.

X X X

Natasha was waiting for them when they drove up in Tony's snazzy convertible to S.H.I.E.L.D.'s Manhattan office. She handed Bruce his battered backpack, and he smiled at her. She returned a small secret one that hinted she could only afford to show a tiny bit of amusement.

Still, it felt like this was symbolic, that she'd fulfilled her end of the bargain made in Kolkata: he would come and help and not be caged. He and Tony followed her into the building, his backpack slung over his shoulder.

X X X

Tony was slouched in a chair at the large conference table, humming something that sounded vaguely like rock-n-roll, his restless fingers playing with his Starkphone. Clint and Natasha were side by side, watching the door for Fury's entrance. They looked... professional. Dangerous. Steve was sitting quietly, watching the others. He caught Bruce's eye across the table and grinned at him. Steve looked boyish, open, when he did that.

Steve cleared his throat. "Doctor Banner, would you mind if I sketched you sometime?"

Bruce was surprised. "I, uh, don't know. I try not to get my picture in the media. If you draw me, what would you do with it?"

"I'd keep it private, unless you gave me permission to show it to the public. I have drawn the Hulk, but then everyone knows you as the Hulk. I'd respect your privacy as Doctor Bruce Banner, though." Steve was so sincere that Bruce didn't want to tell him no.

Tony sat straight up in his chair and swore. All eyes in the room focused on him as he watched something on his phone and jabbed at buttons and made his fingers dance on the screen.

Then he stood and took the phone to the front of the room to the audio-visual console.

"Captain, you can draw him and put the image on Times Square now. It'll be old news. Bruce, sorry, but your cover is blown. Big time. JARVIS sent me a text. This vid started out on some college kid's website dedicated to sightings of the Hulk, but I did a quick check and it's everywhere now. The amount of hits on this thing is phenomenal. It's beyond viral." He connected the phone and brought up the image on the large screen at the front of the room. "I just looked at a few moments of it."

They watched in silence as a green blur crashed into a large building that looked abandoned. The voice of the man narrating the video was speculating that an alien had just landed. The picture wavered as the man moved cautiously closer and closer to the huge green body that had destroyed part of the roof and a brick wall when he'd landed. The Hulk leapt up and looked around and stared straight into the camera for a close-up shot, his expression dismissing any threat from the man. He turned away and sat on a nearby pile of rubble, the shreds of his pants falling off him.

The camera kept rolling as the Hulk sat quietly. The man was fond of the zoom feature and every part of the Hulk's body was gone over, although his genitals were mostly hidden from sight by the Hulk's massive thigh.

He shivered, his enormous muscles tightening for a long moment, before they relaxed and he slowly lay down on the rubble, his eyes closing.

When the transformation began, the man whispered, "Oh my God," as the Hulk shook fiercely. His muscles contracted and his body arced, then shrank, the green of his skin faded, and his curly hair returned to its normal blackish-brown color.

As Bruce watched the video, his fingers moved in the self-calming ritual that he'd learned as a small boy when the world became loud and angry.

The unconscious naked man looked agonized, as the camera lingered on his face, the brutish features softening, becoming smaller.

Bruce felt frozen. In the images he was watching he looked vulnerable, younger, with his unruly hair and closed eyes. God, he hated being exposed like this. He didn't care about being naked. Well, he did, but that was just embarrassment. He was bound to be identified. People who had known him but not known his secret would realize what kind of man he was to carry a monster inside of him.

When it was over, he was asleep on the pile of broken down bricks. The man kept the camera on him for a time, before saying to himself, "I don't know if that boy is an alien or something else, but he's gonna need some clothes."

The camera went black for a moment, and then brightened with an image of himself, now dressed, leaving on a motorcycle. The camera operator zoomed the lens and caught his features as he turned the bike. There was no doubt that he was the same man who'd transformed from the Hulk. "Good luck, son," was heard as Bruce drove out of camera range.

Bruce recognized the old man who appeared next on the screen, sitting at a table with a mug of coffee that he played with as a new narrator introduced him as her grandfather. She giggled a little, and said, "Grandpa, tell me about the man who fell from the sky. He was really cute, for an old guy. Well, he was after he changed from being the Jolly Green Giant."

"Macie, I think you're too young to be looking at pictures of naked men."

"Ah, Grandpa, I'm a big girl now, I'm fifteen. I'm so glad we gave you that cell phone for your birthday, because what you filmed is like, the coolest thing ever. And this is like that oral history project I had to do for school. We just had a fight with real space aliens, and this green guy, he was part of it. I've been looking at images from Manhattan of the battle since I borrowed your phone and found your video. On the Internet people say he's called the Hulk. There's this site about him, by this college kid, Jack McGee, and he's got a video up from about a year ago, when the Hulk fought the Army at Culver University. Jack's blog said he was there and watched the whole thing. So, please grandpa, tell what happened?"

The old man recounted his experiences, with his granddaughter's encouragement. Bruce remembered coming to and finding this thin grey-haired man watching him; curious, but calm.

On the screen, grandpa was saying that the man had denied being an alien. "So, I said to him, 'Son, you've got a condition,' and he seemed tired, but nice. He was quiet, talked with a soft voice. I gave him some clothes and he got dressed. When I asked him if he was a big guy that turned into a little guy, or a little guy who blew up into a big guy, he looked confused and said he didn't even know."

Grandpa added, "You know, Macie, he was worried that if he went to where he said he could do the most good, that it would be where he could also do the most harm. So I talked to him a little about that while I took him to the guard-room. He drank a lot of water, and said he had to go to Stark Tower, that he was needed to fight. I'd turned on the radio and it was all over the news about Manhattan being attacked. I told him to take John's motorcycle and gave him the key. He said thank you, hopped on the bike, and left. I hope he's okay now. When he changed from being that Hulk creature he was in pain; it hurt him."

Macie said, "I thought he'd be bigger as a man, you know, since he's the Hulk."

"Well, he was about as tall as you, Macie, but size doesn't mean much. I saw those newscasts, too, with him as that big Hulk fighting to save us. I was in Vietnam, honey. I've seen war, but those alien things. Lord. It took guts to face them. That boy is a hero. I've been watching the news to see what happened to him, but nobody seems to know."

The video ended there. There was silence in the room, as Tony switched to a new one. Bruce kept his eyes down. Silly, really, of him, to want to put off seeing the looks on the other Avengers' faces.

"Okay, here's the nail in the coffin video. And it's not the only one," Tony said, and Bruce watched as one of his grad students from years ago identified him from the pictures the old man had taken. The video gave a quick rundown on his biography and showed photos taken when Bruce worked at Culver University. Then the narrator explained that Bruce Banner had disappeared after a lab experiment he was conducting killed several people and hurt others.

Tony turned the display off and pocketed his phone. Nick Fury strode in the door as Bruce took a deep breath and said, "Okay, so people know who I am. They know who Tony is, too. And Steve."

Fury moved to the head of the table. "Stark, sit your ass down. Doctor Banner, Stark and Rogers aren't wanted by the authorities. You are. Your position would be stronger if you agreed to work for S.H.I.E.L.D. Charges have been dropped in other cases, in exchange for basically agreeing to remain in voluntary custody with us."

So this was it. S.H.I.E.L.D. wanted him kept on the reservation where he could be monitored. "And if I did sign up? Join the Avengers permanently? What would I have to do when there aren't space aliens to fight? Make weapons?"

Fury glared at him. "Don't play dumb. You're a brilliant scientist; you know you're needed in the labs. Yes, we'd like you to help with weapons and other research. You did it for the Army, after all. But don't go getting all fired up, Doctor. You ran for six years. You want to run for the rest of your life? Besides, you owe us; we've kept Hydra from taking you three times in the last year. We've been protecting you. You'll be safer as part of S.H.I.E.L.D."

"Sell myself into slavery? You make it sound like so much fun." Bruce gripped the edge of the table, realized what he was doing, then dropped his hands down to his lap and twisted them together.

"Be practical, Banner. You've sold yourself before when you needed help," Fury said, and Bruce heard a tinge of disdain in his voice.

"I don't know that I'm as desperate now as I was then." Bruce wasn't going to deny trading his body for survival. He didn't hate himself for that. Nobody had been hurt by it, after all.

"Bruce, you can work for Stark Industries and be on-call for the Avengers. I'm out of the weapons business now." Tony was giving Fury the stink-eye, and Bruce felt a little of the cold that had been numbing him warm.

Fury ignored Tony. "Listen up, Avengers. The Council has decided that the Avengers Initiative is to shelved again. But not permanently. Basically, you would all be considered to be in the Reserves, to be called up again if we have something that our regular agents, or the armed forces, police, couldn't handle. But they want a low profile while we do PR work. The Avengers just kicked the ass of a god and stopped an alien invasion. You're powerful people, all of you, and in a group that's multiplied to the power of ten. There will be a backlash, guaranteed. You're all going to hunker down and let S.H.I.E.L.D. handle it. And Stark, you give Banner shelter and you can be charged with harboring a fugitive."

Natasha spoke up. "Director, there aren't any actual charges against Banner from civilian authorities. He's just wanted for questioning by the police in some towns. Ross played the domestic terrorist card to get authorization to take him in, but that's been dropped since S.H.I.E.L.D.'s been in charge. You've made worse go away."

Fury frowned. "I can if I'm motivated to do so. Doctor, you ready to motivate me?"

Bruce didn't respond, but he consciously relaxed his tense muscles and folded his hands on top of the table.

"No? Don't go making a stupid-ass decision that you can handle everything on your own, Banner. You can't."

Fury turned his head slowly, making eye contact with everyone. "The rest of you are cleared to leave, but keep in communication with Hill. Take some downtime, Romanoff and Barton. Rogers, you too. We can set you up with an apartment in town or somewhere out of the city. Stark, stay out of S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters, but we have more consulting work for you in regards to the alien tech."

Fury leveled his one good eye at Bruce. "Banner. You are a problem. I want you here in S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters for this afternoon. Then we'll transfer you to another facility, out of New York, while we get this mess of yours sorted out. I was willing to let you stay free out in the city, but that was before that video went viral. Now, if you sign an employment contract we'll keep you busy working, and Legal will get your charges dropped."

He pointed a long finger at Bruce. "I consider you an asset, besides being a pain in my ass. You decide not to work for me, fine, you're still under S.H.I.E.L.D.'s protection, but I won't make your legal issues disappear. I suspect you'll find it boring, sitting in a room, reading magazines, but that's your problem. There's no need to run. There's no point, since we will find you, Doctor."

Bruce felt his heartbeat increasing at the veiled threat. He unfolded his hands and let his fingers make pointless designs on his other hand. He was calm. He was so very fucking calm. "Are you threatening me, Director?"

Fury's mouth tightened before he answered. "Consider it a promise. We've tracked you since you fought with the Abomination and ran off to Canada. You've shown that in most circumstances, you've learned how to control becoming the Hulk. General Ross underestimated how much of you remains when you turn green. You calculated how much force clapping your hands together was needed to produce a vacuum to put out the fire Blonski started during your fight with him. Pretty advanced concept for a mindless brute. I want you for S.H.I.E.L.D., but if you run, if law enforcement finds you, or Ross, or Hydra, my agents will have orders to just watch. You're a smart man, Banner, even if you are a stubborn son-of-a-bitch. Do the smart thing."

"How can I trust you to not experiment on me? You had my room all ready on the helicarrier. And I won't work on weapons." He'd sounded okay, he thought. Mild. Neutral. In control. He could absolutely keep things under control, even if Fury's words had fed the flames of his anger.

Fury snorted. "There's leeway to have some things written into your contract, although it's a little late to get on your moral high horse. If you hadn't been willing to experiment on yourself, we wouldn't be having this conversation. You turned yourself into a monster, and you kept experimenting for six years, under very uncontrolled circumstances. I'm offering to give you the backup you need to do your research safely."

Bruce glanced at Fury but stayed quiet. He kept his eyes away from the others. He'd stopped looking for a cure a year ago. He was still doing research on his blood and cells, but that was just for monitoring and for trying to understand how he had first become the other guy. He wasn't obsessed with finding a cure anymore because he didn't believe there was one. In accepting that premise, he'd been able to let go of his despair when he failed. He was able to look outside of himself and his own problems and try to do some good for people in real need.

Fury sighed. "S.H.I.E.L.D. is not your enemy. I'm not your enemy." Fury had gentled his voice, sounding compassionate now instead of commanding. "You'll have to trust, Doctor, that we won't hurt you. I'm not underestimating what it will take for you to do that, and I was willing to move more slowly with you, but there's going to be competition for your custody now, do you get that? There isn't going to be much time to get things settled, and get you into our custody and protection."

Bruce felt like the walls were starting to close in on him. He carefully pushed out of his chair, and inched around to the other side of the table.

"So... Director Fury? Were you crossing your fingers behind your back when you said I'd have safe passage out of here?" Bruce asked, his voice overly polite.

Steve also got out of his chair and stepped in front of Bruce, facing Fury.

"With all due respect, sir, you're behaving like a horse's ass. Doctor Banner cooperated with you when you brought him to the helicarrier. He could have run for safety during Loki's battle, and instead he chose to fight. He's one of my men, part of the team, and if he wants to leave now, we'll be escorting him."

Fury eyed Steve and his expression was guarded. "The Avengers are disbanded, Captain America."

"Maybe in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s eyes. Let me take roll call. Iron Man?" Steve sounded confident that Tony would back his play.

"With you, Cap." Tony strode over and stood next to Bruce.

"Black Widow?" Natasha moved around the table to Bruce's other side.

Fury narrowed his eyes at her. "Romanoff. You're walking a dangerous line."

Natasha shrugged, managing to convey a fatalistic attitude. "I always do, Nick."

"Hawkeye?" Steve asked, his voice brisk, commanding.

"Yo." Bruce glanced over and saw Barton's bow was in his hands. "I'll take his six."

Steve glanced at Bruce, who nodded. Steve looked at Fury.

"We're leaving now, sir. You've made your offer to Doctor Banner, and if he decides to accept it, we'll let you know. I'll inform Hill that we're all taking three weeks off from any missions. Unless the world is about to be destroyed again, then give the Avengers a call."

"You're insubordinate, Rogers." Fury said mildly. Bruce wasn't fooled into thinking that meant that Steve had won this little throw-down.

"Yes, sir. If the situation calls for it, I'll follow my conscience. I thought you'd read my file, Director."

He moved his hand in the classic soldier's gesture to move out.

They left without incident, not even getting raised eyebrows from those they passed in the hallways. Bruce supposed that S.H.I.E.L.D. employees got used to seeing weirder things than superheroes in formation surrounding a man carrying his backpack over one shoulder.

He didn't know why Steve had done that, or why the rest of them had gone along with it. Tony, sure, Tony, could afford to snub Fury, but Steve, Natasha, and Clint worked for the man. Steve had claimed him as one of his men, and during the battle that had been true. He'd followed Steve's orders. The other Avengers apparently saw Steve as their commander, whether they were gearing up to fight or not. He guessed the rest of them really had become a team, instead of the time bomb he'd called them on the helicarrier.

He didn't want them to be in trouble on his account, but he couldn't deny that he felt safer with them.

A short conversation between Tony, Steve, and Clint ended with them going out a different exit onto the roof of another building. They went to a row of helicopters and Clint climbed into the pilot's chair and started doing a pre-flight check. The rest of them took seats, and Bruce stowed his backpack. Steve passed out headphones. Clint started flicking switches and pushed the starter; the engine started to roar, and he heard the sound of the blades moving above him.

He really didn't have very good memories associated with helicopters. He'd been tracked by them, and trapped by them. Fallen out of them. The sounds surrounding him, inundating him, weren't pleasant.

He'd lost count of the number of helicopters he'd smashed. The other guy really found them annoying.

They were at Stark Tower in a matter of minutes. Clint skillfully landed the bird and shut the engine off, the rotors still whirling for a short time before they ceased motion. The others left the helicopter, but Bruce didn't. He closed his eyes and tried to make sense of the roiling thoughts in his head, taking a long, long moment before he took off his headphones, unbuckled his seat belt, and joined the others.

Tony looked gleeful and he waved his arms in an over-the-top welcoming gesture. "All right, go team! And hey, everybody can stay here. I've got tons of room. Seriously, I've been thinking that the Avengers need their own space. Firemen stay at the firehouse, right? Consider the upper floors here as our own clubhouse. I'll trick it out with all the bells and whistles. Pepper and I are looking over the plans for repairing the damage Loki did, and I figured we'd give everyone on the team their own floor. Fix you guys right up. It'll be great. Thor, too. We can't forget about our demi-god."

Clint walked over to the broken concrete left from Loki being smashed into the floor by the other guy. He kicked at it a little, then raised his voice. "Hey, Stark. Got any beer in this place?"

Tony didn't answer Clint. Instead he looked quizzically at Bruce, then interrupted the conversations that had started sounding like so much buzzing to Bruce's ears. Making shooing motions with his hands towards the rest of them, he said, "Go on down, guys. I think Bruce and I need a moment."

When they were alone, Clint waiting by the elevator but out of hearing range, Tony raised his eyebrows and asked, "What?"

Bruce began, "Tony..." but trailed off, not sure what to say. Thank you for giving me shelter? Just... stop talking now? You can't build me my own floor, that's insane? Your closets are bigger than half the places I've stayed at in the last six years – I think I've got culture shock? I don't want to put you in danger of being arrested? Maybe I'll say yes to your job offer? Thanks, but I can't accept your job offer? Maybe Fury is right?

Tony moved closer. He softly rapped his knuckles against Bruce's temple. "Stop thinking so hard. First things first. You're safe here. JARVIS is on the case and the Avengers have appointed themselves as your bodyguards. Let's get some food into you, some scotch into me, and a beer for Clint. Natasha and Steve went to do a security assessment, and Pepper's downstairs talking to our lawyers. I texted her while Fury was harassing you. C'mon. Once we get that wide-eyed look off your face, I'll finally get to show you my workshops and labs."

X X X

Bruce had met Pepper Potts briefly the night before after returning from the debriefing and impromptu pizza party. Tony had introduced him to her. He'd been curious to match a face with the name because Tony's voice had always shaded to a warmer hue whenever he'd mentioned her during the evening.

She had been gracious to him, although the flicker of wariness in her eyes gave away that she knew about the other guy. To Bruce, the conversation between Tony and her reminded him of couples who had been married for decades. She was subtle about it, but there was no mistaking the protectiveness that she felt toward Tony. There was also affection, tempered with a sense of intimacy: each was so known to the other that there was no mystery left to decipher. They were deeply comfortable with each other.

Bruce had been uncomfortable watching them, and he'd excused himself as soon as it had been polite, truthfully claiming he was too sleepy to talk to anybody.

Tony swept him along after they'd left the rooftop, Clint following them since he had apparently taken the first bodyguard shift. Feeling a little shell-shocked, and not having any better ideas about what he should do, Bruce decided that he'd roll with whatever was happening.

Tony pointed to a chair at the big table. "Sit down, Bruce." He opened up the huge stainless steel refrigerator and dragged out cheese and some deli packages. Mustard. Pickles.

Bruce glanced behind him and saw that Clint was by the door, talking on his phone. He did as Tony asked, and watched as Tony's quick hands built him a ham and cheese sandwich and slid it on a plate.

Tony said, "You know, if you had to be outed, maybe this was a good time for it to go down. Sure, watching you go from Big Green to regular guy is cool, but the major news stations have bigger fish to fry. They've been running coverage on the attack on Manhattan pretty much nonstop, and you're not around to interview during this initial interest in your story. I think you can expect the media to show the Hulk kicking Chitauri ass and pictures of you being a professor. Maybe some earlier footage of the Hulk busting out of Culver University, and there was some decent film of you putting down the Abomination that probably will be used."

Bruce sighed. "If I had ten dollars? I'd bet you that General Thunderbolt Ross will make a stink. You know he made me out to be a domestic terrorist, right? Or maybe you didn't know that when you made the weapons to capture me."

Tony grabbed some pineapple-orange juice from the fridge and handed it and the plate to Bruce. "I was the hired help and Ross didn't give me details. I didn't know about the metamorphosis. I didn't know you were even a man, let alone you."

Bruce twisted off the cap and took a sip. "Well, everybody knows now."

"So hang out here with me, let things die down. Fury's a super spy bastard, but he knows what he's doing, and S.H.I.E.L.D. will do damage control. Something else will catch the public's eye and be splashed all over the Internet. You'll be yesterday's news. And you know, that old guy thought you were a hero. That's got to help."

"Uh-huh. Sure." Bruce flashed on all the damage he'd done as the Hulk, the people he'd traumatized and hurt. Killed.

"Are you questioning that you're a hero, or that the old man's video will help?" Tony grabbed his shoulder and Bruce stopped turning the juice bottle around and around in his hands.

Bruce shrugged, and took another sip of juice.

"Okay, Bruce. Just... okay. But don't think this discussion is over." He let go, and rummaged around in the cupboards until he'd found a bottle of scotch that Bruce felt safe in guessing cost as much as he'd made in two months at the bottling company in Rio De Janeiro.

Clint slipped his cell phone into his jeans, and headed straight for the food on the counter. He made himself a sandwich and snagged a cold beer, then sat down three chairs away from Bruce. Clint still seemed to prefer not to be too close to Bruce, despite sitting near him earlier. He still didn't know if it was to make him feel more at ease, or if Clint just wanted some space. He remembered doing the same thing when he was a kid, though. He'd made it a habit not to be within arm's reach of his father.

Maybe he and Clint had something in common besides fighting against Loki. Not that he was going to ask about it, though. He also wasn't going to ask how Clint was doing after being mind-washed by Loki. Clint had been determinedly trying to come across as back in the saddle, and Bruce didn't know him well enough to challenge him if he was faking it. Bruce faked a lot of stuff himself, so he wasn't going to throw stones and knock down someone else's carefully constructed house of cards.

Tony slid onto a seat across from Bruce and sipped his drink. Bruce ate his food, drank the juice, and then stared at his hands as he ran a thumb over his left knuckles over and over as he listened to Tony and Clint.

Tony said, with an air of upittyness, "Well, this is all very domestic." Then he added, in a normal tone of voice, "I kind of like it. So Clint, when I make the Avengers living quarters here, and of course everybody is welcome to stay full-time, or just when they want, what kind of awesome, cool stuff should I include? What's on Natasha's Christmas list?"

Clint grinned, eyes lighting up with enjoyment, and Bruce realized that Clint was probably a Class A enabler.

Clint said, "Nat? A really big bathtub to soak in, and an inside firing range. Oh, and Cap seems fond of tearing up punching bags, according to S.H.I.E.L.D. gossip."

"Go on, go on. Sky's the limit, so don't be coy. So, extra large bathtubs, firing range, work out rooms, a gym?" Tony had gotten out his phone and was making notes.

"For training, yeah. And super-soldier proof gymnastic equipment. Hey, how about an indoor archery range? You know I can keep going on this theme, Tony. Stop me when I hit your budget ceiling."

"Barton, have you met me? I'm _rich_. Keep going." Tony made grabby hands.

Clint chuckled and finished his beer. "Okay, Sugar Daddy. What else, what else? Oh, a climbing wall. A tough one. Really, really high. And how about a place to watch movies? Natasha and I love them. Just think how many movies Steve has missed. It's our duty to help him catch up. Do you think he'd like Star Wars?"

Bruce tuned Tony and Clint out. All of these plans sounded unreal to him. Was Tony really going to turn over some of this valuable real estate and make it into the Avengers' deluxe living quarters and training areas? And would the other team members feel comfortable living like that? Being here was so different from how he'd lived the last six years.

Even when he'd just been Bruce Banner, biophysicist researcher at Culver, he hadn't had much of an apartment. Betty had often told him she despaired of his taste. She'd been joking, teasing, but he could see her point. He just didn't care much about things like furniture and appliances. He'd banked his paycheck and continued to live like the poverty-stricken grad student he'd once been. He'd had a vague notion of turning the money over to her if they got married, to help pay for a house, or maybe start college funds for their children.

That bank account had been seized by the government when he'd been labeled an alleged domestic terrorist, after the Culver lab blew up. Under that classification there'd been a lot of justification for what Ross had done to find him. If he was ever going to live again in the States, openly under his own name, there was a huge legal mess to untangle. He might be given the death penalty, or life in prison, if actual charges were brought against him in court. He shuddered, thinking of the Hulk's reaction to lethal injection or the electric chair. When it came down to survival, the other guy was in charge, not him.

And now, not just covert groups like S.H.I.E.L.D. and Ross's strike team, but anybody who had seen those videos knew who he was. He hoped that people would lose interest in him soon, like Tony had suggested. Running would be more difficult now, and he probably should just hole up here for at least a few days more.

A bottle cap flicked against his fingers and he looked over at Tony. Clint had left the table and he hadn't even noticed, he'd been so lost in his own thoughts. Bruce looked up and saw Clint sitting cross-legged up on the counter, watching the two of them.

Tony said, "Cut it out, Bruce. You're thinking doom and gloom over there, but I got Pepper on this, and she's got mad skills when it comes to managing superheroes' bad publicity. I gave her tons of experience. She texted me, she's on her way up right now. We'll get you some other options besides Fury's offer."

"A superhero? Not even close. Do you even know I've got blood on my hands?"

"I know you see it that way. I understand that. I see it the same way when it comes to the weapons I made that landed in the wrong hands. We can't fix the past, Bruce. Just have to move on and make changes. I think you already know that, because I don't think you were indulging in a fetish when you were playing doctor."

Clint sniggered, and they both looked at him. Clint held out his hands in a gesture of apology, but the amused look on his face never changed. "Sorry for ruining a dramatically tense moment full of angst, but fetish? Really, Tony?"

Bruce had a montage of images flood through his brain, setting bones and treating people for malaria and Lassa fever, taking the pulse of tiny babies, the hours of short sleep and making do with too little for too many. The deaths that had occurred anyway, when medical attention had come too late. He knew he'd saved lives, though. He'd slept better at night after spending the day trying to help others.

He shrugged. "There wasn't much need for a biophysicist in the places I ended up."

Tony leaned closer to him. "Well, I've got a need for a genius level biophysicist who can think the way you do. I've read all of your published research, Doctor Banner. Your work is amazing. You were wasted at Culver. Seriously, I will build you your dream lab. C'mon, we could totally rock the science world with our awesome partnership. Can I offer you a bribe? Entice you, seduce you into saying yes?"

Tony grinned at him, mischievous, attractive, and Bruce accepted that yes, Tony could seduce him, and not just into becoming lab partners. It would be hard to resist him if he ever extended an invitation to sleep with him.

But that would only end in frustration for both of them. Bruce didn't trust himself when it came to participating in sex and feeling the build up of an orgasm with a partner. It had been different when he'd bargained for passage and protection in exchange for a guy using him sexually. He didn't get aroused. _They_ hadn't cared if he came or not. It hadn't been an issue. He hadn't trusted himself with Betty, and didn't trust himself with Tony.

Besides, it was a moot point. The point in question had just walked into the kitchen.

Tony was with Pepper. Beautiful and clever Pepper Potts with her big blue eyes and strawberry blonde hair and her freckled girl-next-door look.

Pepper walked over to Tony and he snagged her hand, brought it up to his mouth and kissed it.

"Miss Potts. Did you miss me?"

She smiled down at him. "Mr. Stark."

The smile changed when looked over at Bruce. She was professional again. "Doctor Banner, it's nice to see you again."

She gently disengaged her hand and moved around the table to sit down next to Bruce. "You know Tony asked me to talk to our law firm about your situation, don't you, Doctor Banner?"

He nodded.

"Well, let me go over what the probable legal issues are, as they see them, and what strategies they would take in your defense. This is just the basics, you understand. The firm will talk to you personally, if you agree to be represented."

"I, ah, understand, and thank you."

She gave him that tight professional smile again. "Thank Tony, Doctor Banner. He thinks very highly of you."

But you think it's a mistake for me to stay here, he thought, avoiding looking at Tony, who was uncharacteristically quiet. Probably she doesn't want to be housemates since the other guy might show up. But maybe there was another reason, and he really didn't think he'd given away that he was attracted to her boyfriend. Maybe something... legal. She'd been warmer last night to him.

Miss Potts laid her Starktablet on the table and started bringing up files. With deft and sure movements of her hands, the information floated up in front of them.

"To begin with, you're looking at issues with sections 802, and 806 of The Patriot Act, in addition to 42 U.S.C.A. Sec. 262a and 7 U.S.C.A. Sec. 840, which regulates biological agents and toxins..."

X X X

Tony was smart. And manipulative. And smart. Bruce had been prepared to be amazed at the quality of the lab equipment, the multiple floors devoted to R & D, the state of the art computer system and volumetric interfaces, the clever and elegant design of the Iron Man suits. The sheer brilliance of Tony's practical applications with robotics. Amazed, but not swayed to stay and play with the cool toys.

Instead Tony had detoured into the lab where he was analyzing the Chitauri tech. He threw his research up into multiple volumetric displays and set the hook.

"I thought you'd like a quick peek, before I show off the line of StarkSmart kitchen and household appliances. Toasters and vacuum cleaners will never be the same, I tell you. And I'm working on a coffee machine that you can program to play whatever music you want to tell you the coffee is ready or that time's up." He softly sang, _One more cup of coffee for the road... da, da-da-da da, da. _I'm not as fond of Dylan as I am of Black Sabbath – for obvious reasons - but some of his stuff really hits home. Ozzy singing _Masters of War_ – wish I'd paid attention to that years ago."

He stepped back and gestured for Bruce to take a look.

Bruce maneuvered his way through the screens floating before him. He looked over at Tony in confusion. Tony grinned knowingly back at him. This wasn't machinery, this was cell samples. Alien biology. The Pacific Bioscience Sequencer data was an even bigger surprise. "Tony, where'd you get the single pass long strand DNA results?"

"We borrowed the sequencer from one of the research labs that the government funded last year. Apparently there's some fine print on those contracts. I'm sure they weren't very happy to have the MIB descend and pack it up. Fury wanted to limit access to the research on the Chitauri, so the sequencer was set up here in the next lab. Very, very classified. Stick around, kiddo, and I'll buy you a brand new one. I went ahead and ran a sample, but feel free to play with it. The result time isn't too shabby. You could start a new sample and have more data in a couple of hours."

"Mm. You've started some light scattering tests." Bruce looked around the lab and spotted the HPLC Sec laser equipment. "Is that commandeered, too?"

"Yep. I really hadn't needed a biophysics and genetics lab before, so things are a little makeshift. You could help me out, get it set up right. I'm an engineer at heart, and I want to play with reverse engineering their armor and those scooters. Say yes, be a pal. Oh, hey, you should check out the microscopes." Tony's tone turned wheedling. "I can get my hands on the newest model 3-D electron microscope. It's very shiny."

Bruce felt a pang of envy. "Unless I snuck into labs while I was moving around, I had to make do with microscopes a high school kid would use. I'm out of touch with the latest models. I've never even seen a 3-D prototype."

He'd had to abandon his makeshift lab equipment countless times. He decided not to mention that to Tony. There was enough of _The Prince and the Pauper_ going on here without adding to it.

Tony said, "Do you use Matlab? I'm betting you used it, didn't you? It's a fairly reliable clunker, got a few quirks, but you probably know how to work around them. It's available here. Sometime soon, I'll show you what I'm using to code up my genius math. Baby, it's like a Ferrari. I'd love to take you with me for a spin."

"Well, maybe just around the block. Tony, I don't know if me staying is such a good idea. I'll think about it."

Bruce turned back to the fascinating data floating in front of him and began to read it more carefully.

Ten hours later, after Bruce and Tony had emptied two coffee pots and eaten something that he vaguely recalled stuffing in his mouth, and, written an astounding number of equations, he came down from his science high.

Tony Stark was a god-damned pusher. Once he'd gotten Bruce hooked, he'd moved to another station in the lab and worked on his own research. He'd played rock-n-roll all night long, although Bruce guessed Tony hadn't absolutely blasted it at ear-deafening levels in deference to him.

Tony had wandered over from time to time and fed him a little more of his theories about how the alien machinery had interfaced with the Chitauri. Tony said he was working on reverse-engineering what had been salvaged. Bruce had a different angle. He wanted to understand the aliens on a molecular level. The Chitauri and their machines had been like puppets with their strings cut when Tony had blown up their parent ship. There had been a connection built into both life form and machines. It was a beautiful mystery and curiosity had always been his weakness.

He didn't know if he wanted to punch Tony or kiss him for sucking him into his Candyland. Hell, it wasn't Candyland. That game was cute and fun and only had minor setbacks to navigate before you finished playing and put it away. No, Tony Stark's labs were Willie Wonka's Chocolate Factory and he'd been given a golden ticket. A person could spend a lifetime here.

Wants and needs. He might want to stay, but was it what he needed? What Tony and the rest of the team needed?

He double checked the analysis from the bi-spectral fluorescent spectrophotometer and wrote a few notes before he quit working, including a list for Tony of lab equipment a top-notch biophysics and genetics lab would include. He walked toward the lab exit with his eyes aching and feeling stiff. Tony wasn't around, he'd probably been collected by Ms. Potts hours ago.

He didn't realize that Steve was on guard duty, sitting quietly by the door, until he almost stumbled into him. Steve had been sketching, but he closed the pad and stood up.

"Doctor Banner. You look tired. Are you hungry? It's been awhile since you and Tony ate that pizza."

So that was what he had eaten.

"Um... do I have you to thank for that?"

"Yes. But I bet you can't tell me what kind of pizza it was."

"You win that bet. Ah... Are you guys really going to take turns guarding me? I mean, that's not really necessary, is it?"

"We'll shadow you until the rest of the security changes are implemented for the building. Fury might change his mind and decide you need to be in protective custody with S.H.I.E.L.D., but we think that's not too likely. But we want to be prepared in case Hydra or anyone else tries to kidnap you. Let me walk you to your room, or wherever you were headed."

Bruce avoided saying, "I'm headed to my room." Instead, he answered, "I just need to do a few things to clear my head and then I'm going to bed."

If he started saying _my room, my labs_, it could soon become, _my home_. Best not to start down that slippery-slope.

They walked along in a comfortable silence until they got on the elevator. When Bruce cleared his throat, Steve looked over at him.

"Steve, you've been working with S.H.I.E.L.D. since you woke up. Do you think they can be trusted?"

"Not entirely. They're not very straightforward. Devious, even. They tried to make me think that it was still the forties when I woke up. And they were working on weapons derived from the huge robot that Loki sent to New Mexico. Tony and I found them on the helicarrier. But I think they're needed, and I think they need the Avengers: all of us, scientists, spies, soldiers. And we need the Hulk. Without your help the battle might have gone the other way."

"Fury hard-balling me? Not going to work. He thinks he can make me choose S.H.I.E.L.D. so I don't get thrown to the wolves, but I'd rather run." Bruce realized he was lacing his fingers together again and shoved them down deep in his pockets.

Bruce stared at the control panel and avoided looking at Steve. "And... joining the Avengers? I think I'd drag down the rest of you, because, well, Thor is an alien prince, and Tony's origin story as Iron Man is heroic. Barton's a master archer, but he trained for it, people will respect what it took to become that good. Natasha's human, and a kick-ass fighter. But if I'm the other guy, then people are seeing a monster. Fury was right: there's going to be a backlash and I think it's going to focus on me."

"Doctor Banner, you joined the Avengers when you rode up on that motorcycle and threw in with us. I don't think I'll ever forget watching you turn and walk so calmly down the street toward that hell serpent."

When they got off the elevator, Steve put a hand on his shoulder. Bruce turned and found himself reluctantly looking up into Steve's eyes.

"I know becoming the Hulk made your life a living hell. But there is such tremendous strength in your anger. If the Chitauri come again, we're going to need that strength. And you understand things about the world that I never will. All of these qualities that you have, the Avengers need. As for S.H.I.E.L.D.? I think you can take them or leave them. If you decide to work with them, you can make your own bargain with Fury. Maybe consult as a scientist, but not develop weapons. You don't like being in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s territory? Work out of Tony's labs instead."

Bruce fought the impulse to look away. He'd opened up this discussion by asking Steve's opinion, but he'd always found it hard to talk about how things were with him.

Steve had lost everybody in his life when he'd been frozen for so many years. Bruce could stop being so self-centered and ask Steve how he was handling the rotten things that had happened to him.

He swallowed. "Uh, thanks. Thanks for talking with me. And Steve, how are you doing? I can't even imagine how it must feel to wake up seventy years later in a strange world. It's got to be a hundred times worse than waking up in another country with no money or clothes and not speaking the language."

Steve nodded. "I broke out of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s headquarters and ran out into the streets. Everything was so bizarre. All the people I loved – gone from me, one way or another. I felt useless, a stale leftover, and angry. Maybe in a way I understand how the Hulk feels. I've punched the stuffing out of a lot of gym equipment. But it's getting better. Agreeing to be an Avenger, that's been good. Although I had my doubts at first. I wasn't sure my teammates and I were going to be able to pull together. Well, you saw how Tony and I clashed at first. But we understand each other now. I'm more of a big picture person; his nature is to be a specialist, and concentrate on what he's really good at doing, although he could be a commander if needed. I think he gave me a hard time until I proved to him I could handle the job; then he was content to let me be in charge. He's showed that when he's needed, Tony Stark will lay down his life to protect others. I respect that about him. I respect all of our teammates. That includes you, Doctor Banner."

Steve's hand felt so heavy on his shoulder, like an anchor tying him to Steve, to the team. But he didn't know if wanted that.

Bruce said awkwardly, "The respect? It's mutual."

Steve moved his hand and cupped the back of Bruce's neck for the space of several heartbeats before letting him go. That surprised Bruce. He guessed that being tactile was something Steve and Tony had in common, since they both had no hesitation about touching him.

Bruce took his hands out of his pockets and fiddled with the hem of his shirt. He said, "I think I'm going to take a shower, and do some yoga and meditate. You're welcome to stay. It's okay if you want to sketch me."

Steve smiled at him and said, "I'd like that Doctor Banner. I'll stay by the door so I can keep an eye on the hallway, if you don't mind the door being open."

"I don't mind."

X X X

He dreamed again of running, but everywhere he dodged or hid, people would point to him and say his name. Then he took down a helicopter by throwing part of a tank he'd demolished into the rotors. After that, Iron Man asked him to sit down on the grass and play Candyland with him. He tried to refuse but Tony took off his suit and he was wearing his Black Sabbath T-shirt and jeans again, and bartered that if Bruce played Candyland with him, then he would give Bruce a blow-job.

He woke up then, hard and aching and annoyed. He cursed Tony's mouth for giving him dreams like that and then turned his thoughts to only mildly stimulating sexual fantasies. He came with a weak orgasm, but it took the edge off his sexual frustration. Masturbation was his only sexual outlet.

Sighing, he turned on his side and stared at the far wall. He'd never had many lovers. Betty was the last person he'd tried to have intercourse with that he cared about, and they'd had to stop when he felt his heart start to go into overdrive. He was terrified that if his heartbeat approached two hundred beats a minute, the other guy would appear.

He was a scientist, so of course he had approached this problem with the scientific method. He'd done the research and he had his hypothesis. It was too dangerous to proceed to actually experimenting. He would take chances with his own body, but he drew the line at involving other people.

He knew that part of the reason his heart would speed up during the arousal stage of sex was due to fear that he'd transform. It was a convoluted, Gordian knot that he saw no way of untangling. Maybe the Hulk wouldn't hurt his partner, but he refused to take that risk.

He could feel his heart start to race just thinking about how Betty had looked in the hospital, so fragile, so damaged. It had been his fault. He'd hurt her the first time the Hulk took him over.

Under the covers, he drew his hands into fists. It made him angry every time he thought about how the Hulk had destroyed any hope of having a lover. A normal life. And that was his own fault, wasn't it? He would take that anger and absorb it, because this was his life and there was no use crying about it. He'd been done with tears a long time ago.

He shoved the blanket down and got out of bed, and made his hands relax. He practiced deep breathing until the sharp edges of his rage receded, then he meditated for an hour. He brought the other guy up to the point of almost emerging and then he let him slide back into the depths of his soul.

He showered then and pulled clothes out of his backpack. Dressing in his other pair of chinos, he chose a loose blue kurtha shirt, which was a little worn but not as shabby as the other two. He remembered the old woman in Kolkata who had offered to swap her deceased son's shirt for medical care for her grandchildren. He never insisted people pay him, but he didn't turn down offers either. And he had needed another shirt.

He tried to look more professional when he was seeing patients, so they would respect him. He'd been wearing better clothes, a suit jacket, an orange Indian style shirt, the night Natasha had met with him. He'd replace his clothes sometime after things settled down. Not that there was much rush. He doubted he'd be working as a doctor for a while, anyway.

He sat on the bed and opened the pad Steve had left for him on top of the dresser, there in plain sight when he'd gotten up, along with a note that the building was secured now and that if he needed anybody to ask JARVIS for them.

He was curious to see Steve's work. He'd always heard Captain America had been an artist, but he'd never seen any of his drawings.

He looked slowly and carefully at each page. Steve had sketched Clint with his bow ready to shoot, grim and focused, and also sitting cross-legged on the counter, grinning. Natasha he'd drawn in profile and her expression reminded him of a lioness, watchful and deadly. He'd also drawn her riding on one of the Chitauri's scooters, looking dangerous and intent.

There was one of her and Clint almost touching each other, they were so close as they stood side by side, Natasha turning to whisper something in his ear.

Steve was good. More than good, because Bruce was transfixed staring at how he'd illuminated that almost hidden intimacy between Clint and Natasha. It made his chest ache, to see it shown like that.

There was Thor swinging his hammer, and smiling widely, dressed in his armor. Loki, in his horned helmet, and Steve had caught that bag of cats for a brain look that Bruce had seen in Thor's brother.

Iron Man hovering in the air, graceful and elegant. Tony and Bruce, heads close together, talking in the lab on the helicarrier, smiling at each other. Bruce touched the picture of Tony in his suit, and thought about what it had taken for Tony Stark to become Iron Man.

He frowned at the sketch of Nick Fury striding through the command center on board, his long coat swirling as he walked, the power that he held evident in his posture, his expression. He wasn't quite Bruce's enemy, but he for damn sure wasn't his friend. He wondered if Fury had any friends, or if his entire life was devoted to S.H.I.E.L.D.

One of the leviathans falling from the sky. Thor on a skyscraper, calling lightning to his hammer. They could be illustrations for a fantasy novel and it had taken place in the streets outside Tony's tower. It still felt unreal.

Bruce, hair wild, looking disheveled with his untucked borrowed shirt, half-turned to look backwards, a resigned, calm look on his face as he walked toward a huge leviathan coming straight at him and dwarfing him. Was this really how Steve had seen him at that moment?

The Hulk, muscles straining, shirt falling off him in tatters as he threw himself towards the leviathan.

Tony with his arm around Bruce outside the shawarma restaurant, and he winced when he saw how Steve had shown how utterly exhausted Bruce had felt.

Bruce and Tony in the lab at Stark Tower, so engrossed in looking at a display that they were a hair away from touching. He didn't remember that he'd been so close to Tony.

A sketch from last night showed Bruce wearing boxers and one of Tony's T-shirts, hair messy and hands open on his knees in a lotus position, eyes closed, face calm, meditating.

Tony smiling with a pleased, smug look, sitting at a table with a large mug of coffee. That expression seemed to be Tony's favorite. He was just so amused at stirring things up.

Cap's shield spinning through the air, after cleaving the head off a Chitauri.

Thor, clasping arms with Natasha before leaving for Asgard. He was so huge and she was so small, but Steve drew them both as wielding power.

Steve had a gift. War had diverted him from being a professional artist, he knew that from his history lessons, but Captain America's talent had survived his long immersion in the ice.

Bruce closed the sketchbook, found his shoes, and went to give Steve back his art.

X X X

JARVIS informed him that Steve was on his way to a kitchen, located on the floor below Bruce's room. Bruce wondered just how many kitchens there were in this place. Most of the tower was devoted to StarkIndustries offices and multiple other corporations who had their headquarters in the lower tower. The upper tower floors were all Tony's playground.

He found Steve looking through cupboards and laid the sketchpad down on the table.

Steve pulled out of can of chicken broth and studied it. "Hello, Doctor Banner. I told the others that I'd cook something for dinner. I hope they can tolerate what I know how to make."

"I can give you a hand, if you like. I've worked in restaurants and learned to be a pretty good cook."

"That would be swell," Steve said, with a grin.

Bruce looked in the refrigerator and freezer, and took a quick survey of the cupboards.

"There's tons of food here. What are you in the mood to eat? American? Mexican? Indian?"

He carefully washed his hands, inspected his fingers and palms for any small unnoticed cuts. Steve watched him, curiosity splashed across his features.

"My blood is radioactive. But as long as I'm not bleeding, I can handle food safely," Bruce said, answering Steve's unasked question.

They put their heads together and soon Bruce was defrosting steaks and soaking them in a marinade he whipped up, while Steve cut up vegetables for a salad.

"I looked at the sketches you drew." Bruce remarked, breaking the companionable silence. "Do you paint, too? You... You're really good, Steve. You captured things about us... I can see where some cultures don't like to have visual images made of their people. It does reveal things about that person."

Steve nodded, looking thoughtful, as he continued to chop celery. "That's true," he agreed. "I think that's what art is supposed to do; reveal truths. When I was a kid, I drew some of the other boys who used to give me a hard time. They used to call me a skinny-balink and play salugi on me." He looked at the expression on Bruce's face and laughed. "Guess nobody talks like that anymore. They used to make fun of me for being so thin and little and they'd take my hat and throw it to each other over my head. That bunch stopped after I drew them doing it. Johnny mostly made them cut it out. He told me it was an eye-opener seeing the cruelty on their faces, and his, and he hadn't realized how mean they'd been. Johnny and I became friends." He paused, and then added more quietly, "He died at Pearl Harbor."

He dumped a pile of shredded carrots into the salad bowl. "What truths did you see in your portraits, Doctor Banner? If you don't mind talking about it? If it's too personal, I understand."

Bruce was silent for a while, preparing potatoes for baking, and putting them in the oven. He could pass on the question, Steve wouldn't mind. But Steve's art had been a gift, of sorts, and he could give a gift back, let Steve know how his art had affected Bruce.

"I've thought about letting myself be Tony's friend, but it's too late for that decision. We're already friends. I saw that in the pictures of the two of us. And he's got no sense of personal space and I apparently don't care about that at all. I can see that I feel easy around him. That's something that doesn't usually happen to me much. And umm... I didn't know I looked that calm, that still, when I meditate. I've got a bad habit of fiddling with my hands and it was odd to see myself so relaxed."

Bruce opened the fridge and got out a bag of apples.

"Apple pie sounds about right when Captain America is coming to dinner," Bruce joked.

Steve smiled. "I do like apple pie. Believe me, I've been teased about it a lot. I like most foods, actually. My metabolism changed so much after I was given the treatment. I think I eat four times the amount I used to when I was still a little guy."

Bruce started peeling and coring apples, slicing them deftly into a bowl and adding lemon juice, brown sugar, and cinnamon and cloves to the mixture. Steve finished the salad and started setting the table. Bruce put the apples back in the fridge and got out the crust ingredients, washing his hands again and checking them over. It didn't take him long to mix the crust together.

Bruce rolled out the bottom crust. "The other sketches about me? The way you drew me going to fight that first leviathan? I almost felt like I was missing a sling shot and five smooth stones."

Steve nodded in agreement, his expression earnest. "Yes. Like David. You didn't have any weapons and it was so huge, it filled the air and the street as it came for us. You looked so small compared to it. Tony had faith in you, that you would become the Hulk, but Doctor Banner, I wasn't so sure. I was afraid you were walking towards your death. But you weren't afraid. You weren't scared at all, you just looked like you had a job to do, and it was time to clock in. After I told you it would be a good time for you to get angry and you said your secret was always being angry, well, you turned to face it and you just changed. I've seen movies where a thing that happens slowly, like a flower blooming, was photographed over time but in the movie it looks like it happened almost instantly. That's what you looked like, changing from you, like you are now, to the Hulk. It was amazing."

Bruce lifted the crust into the pie pan, and started rolling out the top crust. "I can control letting the other guy come out. Unless something like being exposed to gamma radiation happens again. Or if my survival instincts take over. Ross never seemed to learn it was a bad thing to keep shooting at me."

Steve set bread out in a basket, along with butter, on the table.

"I'm, ah, not directing what happens after that, though, except it's better if I change voluntarily, and not from being forced to, like on the helicarrier. No matter why I change, I only remember flashes of things, images out of context. I guess I did all right this time, except I heard I hit Thor."

Bruce retrieved the apples and placed them in the pie pan, then picked up the circle of dough and laid it on top, crimped the sides of the crusts together. He sprinkled sugar and cinnamon on the pie, and then picked up a sharp little knife.

Steve said, "You followed orders, you fought like ten armies, and we think you just got a little carried away about Thor. Doctor Banner, you took out Loki, and saved Tony. You were crucial to winning the battle. If the Hulk is needed again, for the good of this world I hope you'll be here to help us."

Bruce handed the knife to Steve. "You're the artist. Make a design on the top to let the steam out."

"Doctor Banner?"

"I don't know, Captain. I just don't know right now what I'm going to do."

Steve used the knife to make a leaf and vine pattern that circled the crust, and Bruce took it from him and slid the pie into the oven, checked the potatoes and told JARVIS to let the rest of the Avengers know that supper was ready. He'd cook the steaks after they arrived.

X X X


	6. Tony Stark

Author's note: Some conversation from the last chapter was paraphrased from a deleted Avengers scene.

**Tony**

After the pie had been demolished and a post dinner pot of coffee drained, Bruce volunteered to clean up. He pushed his chair back and walked over to the sink, leaving the rest of them still making conversation at the table. He politely turned down offers of help from Steve, Clint, Natasha, and Ms. Potts and instead drafted Tony to be his helper.

"Me? I have people who do this sort of thing."

Hiding his amusement at Tony's puzzled, affronted expression, Bruce replied, "I know. They're not here, you sent them home with pay, right? Until this thing with me gets straightened out? Bruce waved his hand at the table laden with dirty plates and silverware. "Dishes still need to be washed, Tony. It's good to bring order from chaos. Besides, we can talk about the tech while we work. The sooner we finish, the sooner we can go up to the lab."

Natasha's face was deadpan as she looked at Tony, but something about her posture made Bruce think she was holding in a laugh. Clint was grinning as he stood up. "You rock, Kwai Chang. C'mon, Steve, Nat and I are going to watch movies and you're waaaaay behind. Pepper? Want to take a break from work?"

Ms. Potts was biting her lip, trying hard to keep a smile from emerging on her face. "Thank you, Clint. I've got some phone calls to make first, maybe I'll come down later."

Tony looked at her and shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, go ahead and laugh, Miss Potts. I hear it's good for your health. And you know that I have, actually, functioned in a kitchen before. I made you an omelet once on the jet, remember?"

Losing the smile that had almost emerged, Ms. Potts' eyes became wider, and then she frowned. "What I remember is that you didn't tell me the truth, Tony."

"And I've said that I was sorry. I've said it many times. But, because you must need to hear it again, I'm sorry, Pepper."

"I know, Tony. I don't need apologies; I need promises that you'll take care of yourself. And, I don't think you actually straightened up the galley after fixing me that plate of eggs. You're not known for cleaning up your own messes, so have you ever scrubbed a pot?" She ended the conversation on a teasing note, and Tony visibly relaxed and grabbed her hand and kissed it, another little interpersonal ritual he'd seen them do before.

Tony turned a little in his chair so he could address Bruce. "Doctor Banner. Let's do this. You'll be gentle with me, right? Ms. Potts may be correct; I don't think I've ever done this before."

Bruce nodded solemnly, playing along. "I'm very experienced. I've washed dishes professionally on three continents."

Tony's face changed. "And what a tremendous waste of talent that was," he snapped, his voice sounding vicious, furious.

Bruce shook his head. "Even if my hands were busy scrubbing pots, I could think about my research. And honestly, usually I was glad of the work. I never went hungry when I worked in restaurants." He wished he hadn't said that as soon as the words left his mouth. He hated what he was reading on Tony's face. "And that's enough about my work history."

He busied himself by taking the leftover bread from the table and putting it away. Hoping he hadn't made anybody else feel uncomfortable, he decided that he shouldn't joke about the time he'd spent on the run.

He kept his back turned while he emptied the dishwasher of clean dishes, feeling awkward and embarrassed that maybe he'd come across as whining. Everyone at this table, except maybe Ms. Potts, had experienced tough times. Tony had been an injured prisoner in a cave and Steve had grown up in poverty during the Depression. He'd bet they both, plus Clint and Natasha, weren't strangers to missing a few meals.

They'd read his file, but that wasn't the same as hearing about his hard times directly from him. He'd already shared with the class about his suicide attempts, but he'd just wanted to point out how futile it would be to shoot or drug him. He sorted clean silverware with a little more force than was necessary and resolved to not talk about _any_ of his experiences from the last six years.

Bruce listened as Tony got up and kissed Ms. Potts and shooed her and the rest of the team out of the kitchen.

When he turned around Tony was standing there, staring at him with his arms crossed over his chest. He looked like he wanted to explode.

Bruce sighed. "If you're getting all worked up because of what I said, just drop it, will you? Washing dishes never hurt anybody." He walked over and took Tony by the arm and towed him to the sink. Tony didn't fight him and Bruce could see him shrug off his indignation. He smiled at Tony, relieved that his friend was going to drop the subject.

Bruce said, "Here. You rinse the dishes and put them in the dishwasher. It's not rocket science."

"Rocket science I like. This, not so much." Tony said, but he opened the dishwasher and peered inside.

Bruce stepped away and started stacking up dishes on the table. "Ah well, think about how much more fun it is to wash dishes than doing other things you despise. Attending board meetings, maybe? JARVIS?"

"Yes, Doctor Banner? How may I be of assistance?" JARVIS replied, sounding imperturbable.

"Could you play Tony's favorite music, but keep it low? Thank you." AC/DC began playing quietly, while Bruce brought the first armload of dishes to the sink, stacking them carefully where Tony could reach them. Tony rolled his eyes, shrugged, and grabbed a plate.

"The bio-mech connection? I'm throwing everything I've got at it, and I'm still missing something that will let me unlock the secret. I'm hoping your research will be part of the solution, Bruce," Tony said, shoving dishes efficiently into the dishwasher."

"Mmm... well, you can review what I did last night. You've got plenty of samples of tech, right? We left a pretty big mess all over Manhattan. I assume S.H.I.E.L.D. has been cleaning it up, keeping it out of the public's hands?" Bruce brought over more dishes and nudged Tony with his hip so he could have room to deposit them.

"Oh, yeah. You missed all of that because you were dead asleep. There's tons of broken bits being warehoused and bodies on ice. They've found forty-six weapons in one piece, but they don't work. I've been looking at one that reminds me of a bazooka all day."

They made quick work of the rest of dishes as he listened to Tony recount the tests he'd run so far. Tony dried his hands with a towel and leaned back against the counter. He threw the towel at Bruce's head, but Bruce caught it easily and hung it up on a rack. He grinned at Tony, glad that things were easy again between them, and stood in front of him.

Bruce held up a hand. "Okay, let me throw a monkey wrench into... all of this. The weapons, Tony. If you get them to work, they'll work on people, too. What you showed me last night was the hovercraft tech."

Tony grimaced. "And I'm out of the weapons manufacturing business. I know. I don't want to see anything developed to add to the arms race, but we need to understand how these Chitauri weapons work in case those S.O.B.s return. We kicked their asses, and they might hold a grudge. If we had defensive weapons that could sever their mind-tech connection, like blowing up the mother ship did, then we'll improve the odds of not having them destroy the world."

Tony blew out his breath and shrugged.

Bruce said, doubt in his voice. "I don't know. Should we, as scientists, stifle the pursuit of knowledge? Won't someone else just take up where we left off? Is it or is it not our responsibility what others do with the knowledge we uncover? Or should we take a personal stand and refuse those lines of research we can see are going to lead to destruction? We need to think hard about what we're doing with the Chitauri research."

"Good questions, Professor," Tony said seriously.

Sighing, Bruce crossed his arms, tucking his hands into his sides. "I'm the poster child for reckless science. I turned myself into a monster. I was so sure that I'd found the answer to protecting soldiers from gamma weapons. Fury was right about the experiments I did on the run. It was guerrilla science at best, and I was still experimenting on myself. This past year, I've stopped being so damn obsessed with finding a non-existent cure."

Tony stepped forward and grabbed Bruce's elbow, steadying him when Bruce stumbled a little, and said, heat in his voice, "_You_ didn't turn yourself into a monster; you were set up. Ross never told you what the serum was based on, did he? You were missing too many variables to make an informed decision. He knew what you were going to do. So did the rest of that team, am I right? Of course I'm right. You didn't aim that gamma machine at yourself. You had help."

"I talked them into it. It's my fault, Tony."

Tony pressed, "You're really ready to stop looking for a cure? What about Stern's experiment? He induced metamorphosis and then reversed it."

"Yes, it worked, but it wasn't a cure. Just treated a symptom. I really wonder if the army continued that research. God, I hope not. The risks of things going very, very wrong are just too high."

"Fury might know. Bruce, you took the same risk so many other scientists have done," Tony replied, his voice rising emphatically as he continued. "Ben Franklin and the lightning storm; the Wright brothers; Salk and the polio virus, Goldberger and Carrion. That wild man, John Stapp. But this is what we do – we discover, we learn, and if we have to take a risk we do it."

Bruce found Tony's eyes mesmerizing; though he wanted to look away, he found he couldn't.

Bruce shook his head slowly. "Those guys you mentioned... if they failed, they only hurt themselves. I've done terrible things to others because of that decision to experiment on myself. Tony, I screwed up and I can't fix my problem. I have to live with the other guy. I can try to do something to help other people, though, and that works for me."

Tony looked away for a long moment and then back at Bruce. "I saw young American soldiers killed by weapons I had designed. That's when I realized that once those weapons left my hand I couldn't guarantee how they would be used. I won't make or sell weapons anymore, but I made myself into a weapon with the Iron Man suit. Don't think I don't recognize the irony of that. But I have control over what I do as Iron Man."

Tony laughed, but it wasn't particularly a happy sound. "You know, Fury didn't want me on the team originally. My file said I was self-centered, volatile, not a team player. That's a direct quote from a certain S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who assessed me for the position. But I've changed. This, all of this, is extremely important to me. I want to help. This is how I can do it, being Iron Man. I told Loki that if we couldn't defend the Earth we would damn well avenge it. That wasn't a bullshit line to snow him. This is what I believe. And I'm thinking, that yes, we need to develop defensive weapons against their bio-mech. To do that I need to understand how their weapons work. But this is where I think I can draw the line. I'm not going to develop offensive weapons based on their tech. It's kind of a blurry line, but I think I can live with it."

Tony let him go, and Bruce untucked his arms from his sides. "Fury probably has other guys on this stuff, too. I'm sure it's not just on you. And all you can do is figure out what you can live with."

"All too true, my friend, all too true. So, now that we've hashed through the ethical dilemmas, you're going to still help me out, aren't you? I mean, you're just looking at the molecular structures. That's not weapons development."

"Oppenheimer might not have agreed with you. That's how it starts, isn't it? I can get so caught up with what I'm looking at that I can get tunnel vision," Bruce said.

Tony pushed away from the counter and elbowed him, then took his arm and started tugging him towards the door. "See, this is why we should always work together. We can keep the other one from going off on the crazy train."

Bruce chuckled; Tony looked sideways at him and grinned.

Bruce said thoughtfully, "So, does the potential good of my research outweigh the potential harm? I'm thinking... yes. Because you're right, Tony. The Chitauri might come back. We should be prepared to defend ourselves."

"I think the other guy would agree with you," Tony said, as they left the kitchen.

Bruce had a fragment of a memory then, of him and Thor attacking a leviathan.

"Mmmm." he nodded, remembering the other guy's desire to protect the team, stop the invaders. "I think... he would."

x x x


	7. JARVIS

**JARVIS**

Bruce switched to doing a different sort of research after Tony had left the lab for the night. After shutting down his work on the Chitauri biology, he spent a few moments doing deep, cleansing breaths, and then another twenty minutes doing stretches and simple yoga positions to help clear his head. When he finished, he sat back down at the computer station he'd been using. He had to make some decisions and it was time to stop stalling. He needed data.

"JARVIS, a little help?"

"Certainly, Doctor Banner. How may I assist you?"

"Can you do an analysis of these topics in the news media and blogs around the world, and give me samples of the spectrum ranging from very negative to very positive? Also run stats per country of the amount of news coverage. Start three days ago, following the appearance of the Chitauri. First topic: reaction to the Avengers as a group. Second topic: reaction to the Hulk. Contrast current reaction with all former media stories on the Hulk or the damage left by the Hulk. Third topic: reaction to me being identified as the Hulk. Besides that data, could you send me files on the Patriot Act? I'd like to read through it and I would also like a breakdown of current legal thinking on prosecution for domestic terrorists and please include prosecution of those harboring a suspected terrorist. Thank you."

"You're very welcome, Doctor Banner. If I may be so bold, may I follow my own lines of inquiry into your situation with the data? Where would you like the files to be sent, and what level of security is requested for this data."

"Security?" Bruce was a little puzzled.

"Do you wish Tony Stark to be aware of your data requests? Doctor Banner, given these search parameters, you are considering leaving, are you not? If asked directly, I will, of course, share this information with him, but we don't have to leave an obvious trail of bread crumbs, if you don't wish to do so."

"Please use the highest privacy setting you can. It's fine to follow your nose down any paths that you deem relevant, and send the data here to this lab station."

"As you wish, Doctor Banner. Files are being compiled and will be sent shortly."

x x x

Bruce thought about his options as he made himself a cup of chamomile tea in the kitchenette down the hall. Basically, he had two. Stay, or go. He'd been a bit of an ostrich the last two days, but he couldn't put off doing this research any longer. Hiding in Stark Tower for a few days was doable, but he couldn't stay in here forever. He had to make a move, and soon. On his way back to the lab, steaming mug in hand, he had a thought.

"JARVIS? One more thing? Could you also send me any information on Captain America's work as an artist? You can leave out data that only states that Steve Rogers can draw. I'm looking for something more in-depth."

"Happy to oblige, Doctor Banner. It might interest you to know that his work is included in a current exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art that's featuring war-time artists from the seventeen hundreds to modern times."

"Really? Does Steve know about this?"

"I couldn't say, Doctor Banner. I've not received any previous requests on the subject."

"Thank you, JARVIS, I appreciate your help."

When the files were ready seconds later, he settled at the computer. With a few deft gestures, he lifted the files into the air and was soon reading about himself and the rest of the Avengers.

x x x

After an hour, Bruce collapsed the 3-D displays and set a password on the files. He knew that Tony probably had back doors built into everything that blinked binary in his domain, but the extra security might buy him a little more time.

He felt wistful. It had been strange to be part of a group, even if he'd kept to the edges. Though he'd felt awkward at times – well, most of the time – he'd also felt an odd sense of comfort at being part of the Avengers. He still didn't understand why they'd made a point of giving Fury the finger by escorting him out of enemy territory and staying here with him on watchdog duty. They'd saved him from having to perform his party trick, if Fury had insisted on detaining him. He was grateful to them.

But it couldn't last. He'd known that as soon as Steve had started taking that roll call in Fury's office. With the Chitauri gone and Loki no longer a menace, had they taken on his protection as a way to keep being Avengers? Their group identity was so new, the stresses that had shaken it so badly when they'd first formed the team weren't very far behind them. Without something to help them keep bonding maybe they'd just fall apart.

Suddenly it made a lot more sense to him why Fury had let his agents and Steve and Tony defy the Council's decree. Fury was flashing his own finger to the Council. He wanted the Avengers to continue to have a sense of identity, and Bruce was beginning to realize that he was the new rallying point. He wondered if Fury had acted like such an asshole because he wanted to push the Avengers, see if they'd protect their weakest member. Maybe not. Maybe he was usually a dick, but whether that had been an act or just Fury being Fury, the result was clearly a team building exercise.

He supposed if he'd caved and signed the employment contract, that Fury would count that as a win, too. He remembered the dig Fury had made, that Bruce was familiar with whoring himself out, so he might as well drop to his knees for this latest proposition and open his mouth. Nobody had asked him about that. Nobody had even made a shocked face or showed any pity or sympathy or disgust about it. Maybe the briefings on him before he arrived on the helicarrier had covered that part of his history and they'd agreed to leave it alone. Everybody but Tony had been leery of riling him up, after all.

"Time to move on, Banner," he said softly and he balled up his fists. He wasn't going to be S.H.I.E.L.D.'s bitch.

He was leaving in the morning. The team, these five other people, had wanted to protect him, but it was the Avengers who needed protection. He saw that very clearly. Especially Tony. He'd bet money that Tony had asked Pepper Potts not to mention any risks to him and Stark Industries for letting Bruce stay at his home.

JARVIS was a hell of a hacker and had located top-level government documents which made it clear that S.H.I.E.L.D. had a deadline on recruiting him to keep him controlled before he was made the Army's problem again. Ross was behind the push for the Army to regain being in charge of dealing with the Hulk. And if the baton was handed back to Ross, he planned to re-instate the terrorist charges that S.H.I.E.L.D. had dropped, according to what Bruce had read. His nickname should have been Pit Bull Ross, not Thunderbolt Ross.

JARVIS had also included the documents sent to Ms. Potts from Tony's expensive lawyers as a followup from her initial questions on the phone. If – or more probably when – Tony was officially informed by S.H.I.E.L.D., Homeland Security, the armed services, or law enforcement that Bruce was wanted on charges of being a domestic terrorist, then any help Tony continued to provide put him in danger of being arrested, and his assets at risk of being seized.

Bruce would not repay Tony's kindness to him by doing that. He wasn't going to discuss it with Tony. He was going to run for it before power shifted from S.H.I.E.L.D. back to the Army.

The backlash against the Avengers, as he'd suspected, focused mostly on him. A lot of it appeared to be just people scared at how much damage the Hulk could do. They were a package deal, him and the other guy, and he didn't evoke Robin Hood, like Hawkeye did, or have Captain America's good reputation. Nor was he able to make witty remarks like Iron Man to win over people. He didn't have Thor's likeability, and he wasn't attractive and deadly in a mesmerizing package like Natasha. He was a green, huge monster that roared a lot. He was violent, and even if the violence was done in the name of good, the gut reactions of New Yorkers who'd witnessed him destroying Manhattan and Harlem had been fear.

People felt he was just as likely to hurt bystanders as take down the bad guy. He didn't blame anybody for feeling that way. The accident that created the Hulk had killed two other scientists in the Culver lab.

Bruce as himself had a mixed bag of reactions from the public. People didn't like that he'd been passing for human and might unleash the Hulk wherever he traveled. Some reactions were sympathetic, since the news had been leaked that an experiment gone wrong was the reason he'd become the Hulk. Others condemned him for experimenting on himself. JARVIS had run stats from all the surveys done on the Hulk and him. They showed that the public viewed him as the stereotype of a mad scientist, and that seven out of ten people wanted him locked up.

There were a few stories posted by people he'd helped, who gave a different picture, but they were lost among the outpouring of condemnation. He was responsible for the deaths of his colleagues when the experiment had blown up on him. He'd killed a policeman and a soldier when he'd been attacked by Ross.

If he thought that it wouldn't end in disaster with him being a lab experiment, he might turn himself in. But he knew the Army would claim his body belonged to them. They'd classified him as a biological weapon as well as being a belligerent who'd attacked the Army (damn all those tanks and helicopters he'd smashed.) He couldn't let them take samples of his body to make more monsters. Not when he knew what would happen when you exposed super soldier serum derivatives with gamma radiation variables.

JARVIS had easily traced back S.H.I.E.L.D.'s attempts to spin the Avengers into being seen as on the side of the angels. The Hulk had not been included in any positive PR spin by Fury's people. Bruce figured that was Fury's strong-arm tactics again at work to make him ask for S.H.I.E.L.D.'s shelter. But even if he made the best of a bad bargain with S.H.I.E.L.D., the rest of the team would be operating under a handicap with him as an official Avenger.

The bottom line was that if he joined the Avengers he would weigh them down. He wished that his earlier supposition to Steve about that hadn't been proved true. He was going to miss all of them.

But what if the Chitauri or something worse showed up to subjugate or destroy the Earth? If the Avengers needed Bruce's help to research a problem? Or the situation called for the Hulk's strength? It was unlikely, but...

"JARVIS?"

"Yes, Doctor Banner. How may I be of assistance?"

"I'd like to record a message to the team. Don't let them have it until at least six hours after I've gone. Also, can a private message be sent to Ms. Potts, asking her to meet me for breakfast at 6:00am? She's an early riser, Tony said."

"Ms. Potts' message has been sent and will be tagged as priority. Will the message to the team be in a visual format?"

"Yes. Give me a few moments to think it through, and then you can record it. There's a few other things I need help with, after I say goodbye to them."

"I am sorry that you had to make this decision, Doctor Banner."

"But you think it's for the best?"

"Yes, sir. I do."

x x x


	8. Pepper

**Pepper**

Ms. Potts looked alert and fresh when she walked into the kitchen the next morning. Bruce had made a pot of coffee and was on his second cup, head in one hand, slumped against the table. He'd only slept a few hours.

"Doctor Banner, you're up early." She poured herself a cup of coffee.

"Mmmm, yes," he muttered, then straightened. "Oh, sorry, I meant to be polite and do that for you."

"You're not really awake, are you?" She smiled at him, but it didn't reach her eyes.

Bruce shook his head as he yawned involuntarily. "Um. No. JARVIS, please tag this recording as private."

She sat down next to him and waited calmly for him to get to the point of this encounter while she sipped at her coffee. He supposed being Tony's PA for so many years and then his CEO had honed her skills at patience.

"You remember a saying, 'Ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies?'" Bruce set his coffee down, laid his hands on the table and ran one restless finger over and over the knuckles of his other hand.

Ms. Potts finished her coffee and carefully placed the mug on the table, then covered his restless hands with her own.

"What's bothering you, Doctor Banner?"

"That would be a question, Ms. Potts."

"And I'm the one you're talking to about your problem, not Tony, not Steve, not Natasha or Clint. Interesting. Tell me what you want me to do." She made it an order, softened by a small smile on her face.

"If you could do me a favor I'd appreciate it. I'd appreciate it even more if you could keep it to yourself for a while." Bruce wanted to slide his hands free but the sheer rudeness of doing that kept his hands trapped under hers.

"Doctor Banner. Just say what you need me to do and I'll tell you if I can help." The smile faded, a look of speculation and guardedness taking its place.

"I'd like to give you a note that authorizes you to be given my consultant's fee from S.H.I.E.L.D., and in return, could you front me some cash? This morning?" Bruce asked tentatively.

"Well, okay, but if you need to go shopping for clothes, or really anything, it can all be charged to Tony's accounts. I'm sorry; we should have talked about this with you days ago. I know you left India unexpectedly." She had relaxed, problem solved, ready to dismiss him and start her work day.

"No, I don't need clothes." She looked skeptically at yesterday's blue shirt and his pants, both rumpled. He hadn't bothered getting undressed when he'd slept early this morning. "But thank you. I need seven hundred dollars. I'm pretty sure the fee will cover that much."

She narrowed her eyes, giving him her full attention again. "You don't want S.H.I.E.L.D. to know you need your money immediately."

She released his hands and stood up. "You're leaving. You don't have to do this, Doctor Banner. Our lawyers will get the legal issues straightened out."

He shook his head, staring at his hands. "I'm not saying if I'm leaving, but if I were, I would leave no ties to Tony or the rest of the team. Nothing, Ms. Potts, that could be seen as support if anyone is subpoenaed to court. You know what the lawyers' opinions are in the worst case scenario. I'd hate to see that happen."

"I'm so sorry." He heard the regret in her voice and looked up at her pretty features. The sadness he saw surprised him, but not the relief in her eyes.

Intuitive and clever, she was a match for Tony Stark. When she realized he saw the relief that she hadn't been able to hide, shame flashed across her face.

He caught her hand. "Don't, Ms. Potts. It's okay. I know I'm trouble and I don't hold your awareness of that against you. You want to protect Tony – I saw that the first night we met. I want that, too. We're on the same side."

He let go of her hand and stood up. "I'm going to go talk to Steve. I'll need that money maybe in two hours? And I'll have that letter for you to give to Fury." He opened a drawer on a side desk in a corner of the kitchen and took out notepaper and envelopes.

"That's just petty cash, and I'll have it for you in fifteen minutes. Wait here and drink another cup of coffee. You look like you're going to need it."

She walked away, high heels clicking as she moved briskly out into the hallway. He thought she honestly was sorry that he would be a fugitive again, but she wasn't sorry that he was leaving Tony behind. She understood that his staying would put both Tony and the company he'd given to her to run in jeopardy. He'd leave it to her to make Tony understand why he'd left.

He blew out a long breath and said goodbye to the vague, tentative dream of staying here, with everything that had entailed. He pushed his feelings of having stood on the doorstep of this haven and then having to return to the life of an elusive outlaw into the deep well of anger that he maintained. Someday, if he needed the other guy, he'd unleash those feelings to power the metamorphosis.

He'd be okay. He had his memories to take with him, of teasing, and touching, companionship and the possibility of love.

He pushed out of his chair and took Ms. Potts advice. He drank his third cup of coffee standing up, leaning against the counter, thinking about those sketches Steve had made of the team, and how he must have drawn his old teammates, the Howling Commandos, the same way.

x x x


	9. Steve Rogers

**Steve**

Bruce had scribbled out the authorization note, signed and dated it, and exchanged it for the envelope of money she'd handed to him when she returned to the kitchen. He'd also written a second note stating his firm wishes that Tony Stark not engage any lawyers on his behalf. He handed it to Ms. Potts and she skimmed it.

"It won't stop him, Doctor Banner," she said, shaking her head.

Mutely, he took the note from her and stepped closer to the table, placing it in an envelope with her name on it.

Looking up at her, tall in her high heels, he said, "I can't control what Tony does, and I doubt that you could make him drop the whole idea, either. But I can make it clear that he'd be acting without my permission. Show it to the lawyers, Ms. Potts, if he won't listen to reason. No ties to me is best."

"I'm a notary. I could witness it, make it official," she suggested. He watched her worry her lip with her perfect white teeth, and he couldn't help but like her at this moment because she knew what she was offering.

"No, but... thanks. It would only open the door to all kinds of questions from S.H.I.E.L.D. or Ross about how this little discussion came about and that's not fair to you. Let's leave it that I left this for you. It's simpler that way." He placed the note on the table, and she caught his hand and squeezed it.

Tony was lucky to have her in his corner, he thought. He wished her luck when Tony found out that Bruce wasn't going to play this Tony's way and smiled at her before slipping his hand free.

x x x

After sorting things out in his room, he looked for Steve where Bruce had been told he was every morning, no matter if it was here or at S.H.I.E.L.D. Apparently smashing punching bags and doing an intensive workout was the way Captain America dealt with stress.

When he entered the gym, he discovered that Steve wasn't alone. Natasha and Clint were also working out. Bruce watched as they did gymnastics that looked to rival anything he'd ever seen done at the Olympics.

He felt sad for them suddenly, that their talents had been shifted into their present line of work. They might have won medals for their skill if their lives had been different.

Steve broke off a series of kicks to the bag to trot over to him.

"Doctor Banner? Come to join us? I think that's a great idea."

Bruce gestured at his clothes. "Ah, well, I'm not dressed for it. I came to ask if you wanted to go to the Met with me this morning. Did you know that your sketches are part of an exhibit on wartime artists? I thought we could go together. If you want to, that is. Maybe it's too hard or too soon?"

Steve said, shocked, "My art is em_there?_/em At the Metropolitan Museum of Art? Nobody told me that. Of course I want to go. How did you find out?"

Bruce pointed upwards. "I asked JARVIS for articles about your work. He spilled the beans."

Bruce waited a moment, watching Steve's amazed expression. "Also, I want to do a... test run, to see if people recognize me. I don't think they will. I'm just a guy in his forties who's on the short side. I'll wear a ball cap. You could shadow me if you come, and see if anybody's really trying to track me."

"Doctor Banner, don't you think you're jumping the gun? Why not wait another week, let things die down more." Steve looked troubled but Bruce wasn't about to let that sway him.

"No. Am I free to leave here, to come and go? Or did I just swap a cell at S.H.I.E.L.D. for one here?"

A hurt look flashed across Steve's face, making him look younger, less sure of himself, and then his expression hardened. "Don't let Tony Stark hear you say that. Don't you know he'd jump down Fury's throat with both feet to see you get a fair shake? And I'm your team leader, not your captor."

Steve moved with super-soldier speed then and grasped Bruce's shoulders. He narrowed his eyes when Bruce flinched hard and had to fight back feeling panicked. Bruce wanted to curse. He knew his reaction couldn't be written off as just surprise.

"Doctor Banner, this isn't like you. What's wrong?"

Bruce shrugged, feeling the weight of Steve's hands on him. He looked up at him, not knowing what to say. His tell-tale hands were twisting together again so he slid them into his pockets. "Come with me to the museum and I'll tell you afterwards. Just you and me, Captain. If I'm wrong and I get mobbed, you can come to my rescue and tell me you told me so later. Don't say anything to the others; I don't want to have to argue with everybody about this."

Steve tightened his hands on Bruce's shoulders. "Something is wrong; I can see it in your eyes. All right. We'll go to the museum. But you're going to do something for me first. You're too tense." He ran one hand down Bruce's arm and back up. "Do a workout. Use up some of that tension. The museum won't be open until at least nine, if they keep the same hours as they did when I was last there."

"They open at nine-thirty. I thought I'd walk."

"I can see that you're tired of being cooped up, but that's not everything that's bothering you. Do we have a deal, Doctor Banner?"

"I... Yes." Steve let go of him and waved Natasha and Clint over.

"You were learning to do martial arts, weren't you? I don't know any of those disciplines, although I'd like to master them, but they do." He placed his hands on Bruce's shoulders again, turning him around when Natasha and Clint jogged over, and giving him a gentle shove towards them.

"Doctor Banner would like to work out, and I'm turning him over to you two. See what he can do." Steve was using his Captain America voice and Bruce resigned himself to his fate.

"Sure thing, Cap," said Clint, an unholy look of glee in his eyes. He captured Bruce's left arm. "C'mon, Kwai Chang; let's do this thing. Nat?"

She took his other arm, and while there was no trace of amusement on her face, he just knew she was finding this funny.

"I don't have any workout clothes," Bruce said as they walked arm in arm to where mats covered the floor at the far end of the large room.

"You don't need shoes or a shirt. Clint, do you have another pair of gym shorts?" Natasha said. She let go of him and Clint elbowed Bruce before untangling their arms. Bruce knelt down and started untying the soft suede boots Tony had lent him.

Clint dropped a pair of bright purple gym shorts in front of him. "Okay, Doc, tell us about what you usually did when you were taking lessons."

Bruce picked up the shorts, stood up and toed off his boots and socks.

"Stretches, some breathing exercises; my instructor taught Aikido style. One and two handed grabs, wrist-locks, hip throws, Heaven and Earth throw. Guys, it's been awhile. I haven't worked with anybody since I left Brazil. I kept practicing the forms and running, though." He swapped his chinos for the brightly colored shorts and pulled his blue kurtha shirt off over his head.

Natasha motioned him to follow her out onto the mat. Clint jogged over to a small cooler on a bench and rummaged in it for a bottle of water.

Bruce took a deep breath and settled his mind. It was probably a good idea to brush up on what he'd learned, since he'd be making his way again on his own. Hulking out was usually overkill, when he mostly needed skills to get away from someone who wanted to beat him up.

He'd be gone in about two hours. It was nice spending this last bit of time with his team, though he was glad that Tony wasn't here. He could very nearly read Bruce's mind and was sure to figure out what Bruce was planning. He'd try to argue Bruce out of going. It was better to not have any last stolen moments with Tony.

Natasha faced him and put her hands on the back of his neck, tugging his head down until their foreheads were touching. They stayed that way for several long moments, and he heard her soft breaths, even and measured.

She said, "Be careful, Bruce." Then she brushed her mouth across his and stepped back, bowed to him. He returned the bow and imitated her as she began a series of stretches. Clint still had his back turned to them as he finished drinking.

She knew. She knew, and she'd given him her blessing.

x x x

He passed Steve waiting half a block up from Stark Tower on Park Avenue. His plan was to turn left onto 37th Street and then head up Fifth Avenue to the Met.

It had been easy leaving from of one of the ground floor's restaurant kitchens. JARVIS had given him access to the locked service elevator and had directed him to the supplies he needed. JARVIS would make a hell of a partner if somebody wanted to go on a crime spree.

Once outside the restaurant work area, he'd tied on the apron and put on the hair netting he'd found when he ducked into a supply closet. His empty backpack went into a garbage sack that he carried through the busy kitchen. Waiters and waitresses were picking up their orders and cooks were making things sizzle or stirring huge pots on the industrial size ranges. He simply walked along, looking busy and preoccupied, right to the service doors. Once he was outside he tossed his sack into the trash. If Fury had bugged his backpack, and Bruce hoped he had, then it would lead S.H.I.E.L.D. on a wild goose chase. JARVIS had provided him with the trash pick up schedule for the building and a garbage truck was due to stop by in about three hours. By then, he'd be on his way in the opposite direction.

The apron and hair net went into a different trash dumpster before he emerged into a more public area, where he tugged a plain ball cap from a back pocket and onto his head. He was wearing a pair of Tony's jeans; they were a little long but were more or less in good shape without any holes. Under them he wore long bermudas. He suspected that Tony had included those in his little clothes care package because he thought it would be funny. He wore another of the shirts Tony had dumped on his bed the other day, when he'd realized that the backpack Bruce had gotten back from S.H.I.E.L.D. contained everything he'd owned in the world. He wore the plain blue T-shirt under his own shabby green-striped button-down.

He planned on ditching the outer clothes after he'd said goodbye to Steve. Some of the cash from Ms. Potts he'd stashed in a money belt around his waist; the rest was around his ankle in a small pouch with a very, very stretchy fastener. He hoped it wouldn't be torn off if he did hulk out, but he'd managed the other times he'd ended up naked and without any money somewhere.

He'd left his pitiful laptop and various ID's back in his room. S.H.I.E.L.D knew all of them. JARVIS had helped him come up with a name and information that he could use: a man who looked a bit like him but was a missing person. If he got taken in by the cops, he would say that he'd left home voluntarily to see the country and his ID had been stolen in the Big Apple.

He had debated trying to shake Steve off his trail, but hello: super-soldier. Besides, he wanted Steve to support his decision, not help S.H.I.E.L.D. find him.

The walk to the Met took about a half hour. Every so often, Bruce stopped and looked into store windows. Once he ducked into a small produce store and bought himself a pear. He'd long ago learned to use such small stops to check out the people on the sidewalks nearby; nobody seemed to be shadowing him.

Once he got to the museum, he climbed the large wide front steps and sat down on the far right underneath the bushes, by a large double pillar. There were other people, families, couples, tour groups, all making themselves comfortable on the high steps, talking or eating, or quietly sitting like he was. So far, nobody had seemed to recognize him. The pictures from Culver were at least six years old and in the ones where he'd changed from the Hulk he'd been asleep and looked younger. He was tired from the workout – Clint and Natasha were fiends and had double-teamed him – and from not getting enough rest last night. He hoped he looked older than those pictures.

Steve jogged up the steps to him and stood in front of him, several steps below where Bruce was sitting with his knees pulled up, his hands clasped around them. After looking at him for a moment, a strange expression on his face, Steve sat down right next to him. Putting his arm around Bruce, he bent down and kissed the soft skin under Bruce's ear. When Bruce stiffened in surprise, Steve tightened his arm around him, holding him in place.

"Just go along with this. There were two S.H.I.E.L.D. agents stationed in the lobby at the tower, but they never noticed you at all. Nobody else tailed you here that I could tell," he whispered into Bruce's ear. "Act like we're together. If S.H.I.E.L.D. or Hydra or Ross's team is looking for you they won't think of you as being part of a couple."

"Steve, you really think anybody is going to buy that I'm your boyfriend?" Bruce whispered back, hearing the utter disbelief in his own voice.

For an answer, Steve tilted Bruce's chin up and kissed him full on the mouth. It was a good kiss. If Bruce didn't know better, he'd think that Steve had meant it. He'd had no idea how much Captain America would throw himself into undercover work.

He was a little dazed when Steve gentled the kiss and let them both breathe.

"Yes," Steve said in a low, intimate, em_private_/em voice, "Yes, Doctor Banner, I think people are going to look at us holding hands or kissing here on the steps and think that we're a couple. And since you've decided to leave today, I thought I'd get a little fresh and steal a kiss from you, since I don't know when I'll get the chance to ask for one nicely."

"Steve? Kissing? Maybe you'd better call me Bruce. So what are you saying? Besides that you think I'm leaving. I... oh, hell. If I was leaving, it would be because it's the right thing to do. But you're not going to know that, see? You can't know what I'm going to do, because then you can't testify that you knowingly let me go."

When he started to twist his hands together, Steve took them and separated them, held them in his own larger ones.

"Every time you do that I want to put my arms around you and hug you. Every time, Bruce. I don't know if I want to go to bed with you or if you have feelings for me, but I have wanted to kiss you. You're leaving and I'm through with promising people kisses or dances when we next meet up. So I took that kiss now. I know I shouldn't have done it. But I'm not sorry."

Steve sounded defiant, but now that he'd acted on his impulse Bruce had a feeling he'd start thinking about things like "forced" and "harassment"; while he never had a clue that Steve had been thinking about him and kisses in the same sentence, he didn't want Steve to feel bad for this stolen kiss. Because Bruce was the fucking Hulk and if somebody tried something sexual with him that he didn't agree to or want, and that he couldn't stop by saying no or fighting his way free, then that person would simply be smashed. Fast. Before they could pull down a zipper or pin him to the ground.

"Steve," he said softly. Steve was _looking_ at him, and he was holding Bruce's hands, keeping them safe. "I'm not sorry you kissed me. And if I was leaving, I'd ask for one more, something to take with me on the road."

"You're leaving, Bruce. God, Tony is going to go crazy," Steve insisted, clearly worried.

"Don't let him, Steve. Take care of him. He's not as tough as he thinks he is."

"And you, you're a lot tougher than you look, Doctor Banner. I know a sacrifice play when I see it." He looked away for a moment, and then looked intently at Bruce. "I guess if you didn't have it in you to make one, then you wouldn't have joined the Avengers. You stay safe, and you stay free," Steve said, so very low.

Bruce moved his hands in a bid for freedom, and Steve let him go. A little awkwardly, he shifted and settled himself on Steve's lap, facing him. Flipping his ball cap around, he put his hands on Steve's shoulders. "I'm asking, Steve. Nicely," he said very quietly, watching Steve's eyes.

This kiss was more bitter-sweet than passionate, but that was okay. Bruce would treasure it.

x x x

After Steve paid for Bruce's ticket, they climbed the stairs to the third level and went straight to the exhibit. Steve said very little to him as they walked but held his hand as if he could anchor Bruce to him and not let him drift away.

They walked into the room where Steve's art was hanging on the wall alongside artists like Homer Winslow, Alfred Waud, and Bill Mauldin. There were photographs or portraits of each artist, intermingled with their works and Steve stopped at the one of a very young Bill Mauldin, sitting cross-legged on the top of a desk. "We all loved Willie and Joe. Did he make it through the war?"

Bruce nodded. "I know he was wounded, though, up on the front lines. He became a political cartoonist afterward." They read Mauldin's biography. Grinning, Steve said, "So Patton wanted to throw him in jail for being disrespectful to officers, and Eisenhower said to leave him alone. Well, laughing at Willie and Joe thumbing their noses at stupid orders helped us as much as having hot food and a dry place to sleep. Eisenhower was a smart man."

They read all the artists' biographies. Some explained the serious mission some of these men had taken on, to show war as it was, not the white-washed versions used on recruiting posters or to stir patriotic feelings. They had been hired by newspapers or appointed by their countries' armed services to document the battles. Then there were the artists like Steve, shown in his WWII Captain America outfit, who had drawn for themselves and their comrades. They'd captured the lives of soldiers far from home: men and women leaning on each other, trying to survive and trying to forget the misery around them for a short time. Steve had drawn Peggy Carter and the Howling Commandos, all of whom were probably dead. Bruce knew it had to be difficult for Steve – for him, this part of his life had happened only days ago, not seventy years ago.

All the drawings and paintings were like a punch in Bruce's gut, which surprised and confused him. He hadn't expected for these images to feel so personal. Though he felt an impulse to leave, to get out of there as fast as he could, he stayed because of Steve, who kept holding his hand like a vise as he slowly looked at each piece of art.

Steve's expression stayed locked down as they stared at dying soldiers wearing a variety of uniforms. There were scenes that included horses falling and wagons overturning, jeeps blown to pieces, cannons firing, aircraft flying overhead, farmsteads burning, buildings and homes reduced to rubble in Europe, the Middle East, and America.

Bandaged soldiers still fighting, exhaustion lining their worn, bloody faces.

Bruce was struck by the timelessness of it all. Instead of arranging the artwork from the seventeen hundreds to the present day, it had been grouped by theme. Battles, patrols, tending the injured, the dead, soldiers or sailors socializing, eating, reading letters, in foxholes and under broken roofing while rain poured, playing cards: all of it portrayed by men who had seen with their own eyes the carnage and the struggle to survive.

Bruce couldn't stop looking at the sketches and paintings of the dead, bodies caught in barbed wire, WWI soldiers lying in a heap on the battlefield, Union Army soldiers dragged to the side of a ravaged battlefield while horse carcasses burned in a pyre.

He'd killed a soldier and a policeman. He didn't remember what had happened, but he was at fault. He'd thought a lot about that before he'd shoved a gun in his own mouth – he'd sworn an oath as a doctor to protect life and instead he'd taken it. He'd killed Chitauri, he knew that, but it had been sanctioned and he and the Avengers were defending their world. Not just Bruce defending himself.

He remembered trying to lift Thor's hammer when he'd become the Hulk while on the helicarrier. He couldn't do it, and that had puzzled and enraged the Hulk. Thor had explained the legends of his hammer to Clint after they'd demolished three pizzas between the two of them during the pizza party at S.H.I.E.L.D.'s mid-town office. Bruce had listened, quiet and unobtrusive, and learned that no unworthy person could lift Mjolnir, Asgardians included. Apparently there'd been a long line of guys who'd been trying to move it when the hammer had landed in New Mexico after Odin had taken his son's power from him. Clint had been there at the time and was curious about it.

No unworthy person could lift Thor's hammer. Well, that validation of what he already had known about himself didn't change anything. Even an unworthy person could still do worthy things. That was the whole point of focusing his life on helping other people. It didn't buy him redemption. It didn't cleanse his soul of the mistakes he'd made or the harm he'd caused. He just wanted to be able to go to sleep each night knowing that he'd done his best that day to make somebody else's life better.

They'd just turned a corner when Steve's breath drew in sharply, and he held himself absolutely still.

"Steve?" When Steve didn't say anything Bruce glanced at the sketch Steve was staring at, read the plaque underneath it.

Steve had drawn this and it was just horrible. The sketch was one of a train on a high trestle bridge, isolated. There was snow on the mountains behind the train and in the deep ravines at the bottom of the picture. A dark-haired man was star-fishing as he fell, one of his hands reaching up to where another arm and hand were futilely grasping for him. The look in his eyes was one of terror, and his mouth was open in a scream.

"God, Steve, I'm so sorry. Do you want to sit down, leave?" The plaque said that Captain America had done this picture after his good friend Bucky Barnes, one of the Howling Commandos, had fallen to his death during a mission. Captain America had been lost shortly afterwards, after stopping the Red Skull from shooting missiles at the East Coast. The plaque hadn't been updated to read that Steven Rogers, Captain America, had been found and was alive.

Bruce stepped in front of the sketch, needing to focus Steve back to the present. He didn't let go of Steve's hand, though. "Steve? Maybe this was a mistake? Coming here? I'm sorry; I should have realized that it was too soon for you. Do you want to go?"

Steve looked at him then, and his eyes were a little wet. His voice quiet, but strong, he replied, "It wasn't a mistake, Bruce. It just took me back, is all. Bucky and I grew up together, in Brooklyn. I miss him."

"I'm sorry for your loss. If you feel like talking, I'd be honored to listen," Bruce said, feeling awkward.

Steve let a slow smile grow on his face. "He was a pistol. Tony reminds me of him, the way he's such a flirt and always has something smart-alecky to say. Bucky had a knack for sweet-talking girls. He was always trying to get me to double-date with him, and you know, he made me laugh. He used to stick up for me." Steve swallowed hard and then tugged Bruce back next to him, still holding his hand. "He was a good guy and a fine soldier. I loved him and I was proud to have served with him."

Steve stopped for a long time in front of a sketch he'd done of a beautiful dark-haired woman in a short leather jacket and trousers holding a long weapon in front of her. In the background men in combat gear and similar weapons were milling.

The woman was looking straight out of the drawing, and there wasn't a hint of a smile on her face.

"My Peggy," Steve said, heartbreak in his voice. "She always did like handling a Thompson. I wanted to marry her."

Bruce thought about Betty, how they had gone back and forth about getting married, and how brave she had been the last time he'd seen her. Betty would have been a good soldier, and the way she liked taking charge, she'd have made a good officer.

Steve didn't seem to want to talk about his Peggy and Bruce wasn't going to push him about it. Steve was lost in his memories, Bruce thought, but he didn't let go of Bruce's hand. Maybe he was the one anchoring Steve this time.

When Steve was ready they finished the exhibit, stopping one last time at a blown up photograph of Steve wearing a torn leather jacket with his Captain America uniform underneath and visible in places, a combat helmet on his head. He was talking with a group of soldiers who'd obviously seen some hard fighting prior to the picture being snapped. Surrounding the photograph were sketches of these men, some playing cards, one smoking a cigarette, one using his helmet as a wash basin, and others engaged in various army day-to-day life.

The plaque stated that these men were the Howling Commandos with Captain America, Steven Rogers. Steve's face turned pink when he read his art was held to be comparable to Edwin Forbes' sketches of Union soldiers' camp life during the Civil War.

"They were your first team, weren't they, Cap?" Bruce said, his voice pitched so Steve alone could hear him since a few people were making their slow way closer to them.

"Yes. We went on a lot of missions, fought hard together. They're all gone now, Dum Dum, Jim and Gabe, everyone; Fury checked for me. I miss them, and Peggy. She... well. Bruce, I'm going to miss you. I wish you'd stay with the Avengers."

"I don't trust Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D. And I think that there's worse than them that will be coming after me. Remember, because you're going to be asked, maybe under oath, that I never told you I was leaving."

"So if you disappear from the museum, I expect I'll see you at Tony's place."

"That's what you should expect, Steve."

"Thank you, Bruce, for coming. It was good to have a friend with me today. I'm going to go and sit in that alcove for a while. I'd like some privacy, if you don't mind. I'd like to hold a vigil for my friends from long ago and yesterday."

A tour group had entered the room and Steve spoke a little more loudly, going along with Bruce's ruse. "Maybe you'd like to look at the rest of the museum? I'll catch up to you later either here or at the tower."

Bruce nodded, and Steve drew him into a fierce hug. He allowed himself to cling tightly to Steve's broad back for a few moments longer than he should have, before finally loosening his hold and walking away.

Stopping before he exited the room, he gave Steve one last glance. _Goodbye_, he whispered, turned, and went back on the run.

x x x


	10. Epilogue Bruce

**Epilogue - Bruce**

Hours earlier, having ditched his outer clothing in two different bathrooms at the Met, he'd taken a city bus down to where he could buy a cheap ticket to Philly on a Chinatown bus line. It was a good way to get out of New York fast. He'd been ready to take his chances on foot if he spotted any surveillance, but nothing alerted him on either the city bus, or when he'd waited on the street in Chinatown, or on the more raucous bus shuttle to Philly's Chinatown area.

Now, someone shoved Bruce as he exited the packed Chinatown bus, but he didn't take it personally. Every other person who'd ridden to Philadelphia with him had used their elbows or hands to push their way onto the bus or to grab a seat, and they were doing the same thing getting off.

The two-hour ride had been barely controlled chaos. The bus driver had lived up to the company's bad reputation, speeding and taking curves too sharply, but Bruce was not inclined to be picky for a twelve dollar fare. Besides, he was used to it from riding cheap South American and Indian buses.

He couldn't risk taking another bus or a train though. S.H.I.E.L.D., at least, would begin tracking him through any and all mass transit options. It was why he'd chosen the Chinatown bus line with their ticket office on the street, employees who didn't care about ID and who didn't ask questions or care much about who was riding their buses.

He figured he had about three or four hours before Steve returned to Stark Tower and let the cat out of the bag to Tony and Clint. Clint wouldn't come after him. Tony, he might. Bruce had figured out that Tony was a people collector. He had already acquired a small, but quality, collection. He had Pepper and he had his driver, Happy, and his friend Rhodey. And now, Bruce suspected, he'd added the Avengers to that list – even one who'd gone AWOL.

He kept his ball cap jammed down low on his head and he didn't look anyone in the eye. In other places that might have alerted people that he was hiding something, but in bigger cities, that was normal behavior. He looked scruffy, but clean, and he would wait to pick up a new backpack. For now, anybody who noticed him would think he was just a day traveler.

He was going to hitchhike to Texas, cross the border into Mexico, and make his way to Tapachula, Chiapas. There was a priest there who took care of people who traveled across borders without papers. He didn't ask questions as he provided spiritual and material aid to those refugees who ended up at the mission. The priest would know where a doctor like him would be welcomed. When he left Chiapas he would cross the Suchiate River into Guatemala on one of the many illegal rafts that ran goods and people between the two countries.

After that, he would be in the wind.

When he left the bus depot, he walked for a while on Arch Street and angled up towards I-675. He waited for twenty minutes, hanging back from the entrance ramp so he wouldn't draw the ire of any of Philly's cops, before a car stopped.

"Hey, Dude, where you headed?" The driver was a young guy in his early twenties. His car had a bashed in front fender and a different colored trunk lid, but he'd spoken without slurring his words, and he was smiling at Bruce.

"I'm going South. Are you?" Bruce kept a friendly expression on his face, even though he couldn't manage a smile.

"Going to Knoxville for a family reunion. You coming along?"

"Yes, thank you." Bruce opened the car door and got in.

"I'm John. Who am I riding with?"

"David."

"Okay, Davy, we can take turns picking the tunes, and if you've got any money you want to kick in towards gas, I won't say no. If you don't, that's cool. I've been down before and people gave me a hand. I like to pass that on, you know? When I can." John shifted into first gear and pulled onto the ramp, rapidly gaining speed as he entered I-675.

Bruce put on his seat belt, then reached into his pocket. He pulled out a twenty and passed it over.

"Great, appreciate it, man. So, Davy, can you believe that we had actual aliens attacking New York City this week? Man, I can't wrap my head around it. And those Avengers, were they cool or what? Iron Man, what a hero. Steering that missile away from Manhattan and sending it to the aliens. That's what he did, you know. He blew up the mother ship, man! I hear the guy is like, super rich."

"Mmm."

"And Thor. It's like having fairy tales come to life. Or history with Captain America. Jeez, he's like from my grandpa's time. Love that shield of his. Hawkeye is cool. Makes me want to practice with a bow and arrow, which I haven't touched since I was a kid at 4-H camp. And Black Widow, she's so hot. I watched some footage of her fighting and man, she makes ninjas look lazy."

Shifting slightly to look out the passenger window, Bruce mentally crossed his fingers that John wouldn't mention the Hulk. So far nobody had seemed to recognize him but if this kid was interested in the Avengers, then he'd probably seen the footage of the Hulk turning back into a normal sized human.

No such luck. John went on, "Now the Hulk. He saved Iron Man. Did you see that footage? Where the Hulk caught him in the air when Iron Man was knocked out? That was good. But he's a monster, even if he was a good monster this week. What about next week, when something makes him mad? He's taken down tanks, man. He reminds me of my nephew when the kid throws a tantrum. You can't stop Jimmy from breaking shit and hitting people in his way. The Hulk needs to be on a leash. A short one. Nobody's seen him since the battle, so maybe he got locked up in his human form. They can let him out if the aliens come back."

Bruce kept quiet.

John rattled on. "Okay, maybe you don't feel the same way. Maybe you feel sorry for the guy, uh, Doctor Benner, or something like that. I feel a little sorry for him. Cause, man, I know he didn't want to turn himself into a big green creature. But what's done is done and he sure is dangerous when he turns green. I wouldn't want to meet him."

Bruce glanced at John, and for just a moment, just for two seconds, he wanted to tell the kid that, actually, he was riding with the Hulk right now. The irony of this conversation was tempting him to push just that little bit further. He could be mean. Sometimes people didn't get that about him. The look on John's face would be priceless.

He sighed instead. He wouldn't scare the kid. He wouldn't act like his father.

Shrugging, Bruce said, "Maybe you're right. Guess time will tell if the Hulk stays a good guy or goes rogue. Maybe he'll just disappear again. He does that, I hear. Say, how about some tunes? It's what? About eleven hours to Knoxville, I think."

John was successfully diverted into talking about music and once he'd put on a Steve Earle CD, he listened to the songs and didn't bring up the Avengers again.

Bruce pulled his cap down over his face and pretended to sleep so he could avoid any further chatter.

After a while, he wasn't pretending.

x x x

Five months later, he'd had a couple of close calls when a man in Alabama and later a teenager in Mississippi had recognized him, but he'd gotten away without resorting to transforming. Apparently there were a lot of false reports and law enforcement officers were inclined to be skeptical.

He thought that S.H.I.E.L.D. agents had asked questions about him shortly after he'd made it to Guatemala. Luckily, the parents of a little boy he'd treated for an infection tipped him off. He'd run to Nicaragua and found work repairing sewing machines and cutting equipment in a blue jean factory in Managua. He rented a small room in the Santana Barrio and let it be known he could treat the sick. He found reliable medication sources and second-hand medical equipment and autoclaves. With some ingenuity, he cobbled together a laptop that he used for research and to keep tabs on the Avengers.

He was proud of his team and the work they were doing. It seemed that there had been no shortage of weirdness for the Avengers to deal with for the past few months. EMS had even developed a new code for anything that was super-villain related: Code Blue.

Code Blue was called a lot in New York City.

He didn't read about himself.

x x x

"Bruce, por favor." Bruce looked up from the sewing machine he was fixing, and Benjamin Garcia, his supervisor, beckoned him to come. Taking off his glasses and sliding them into his shirt pocket, he followed Garcia through crowded rooms, sewing machines whirring and machinery clanging, to the supervisor's office. He stopped dead in the doorway when he saw they weren't alone. There were two National Police officers and an American Army officer standing by Garcia's desk.

_It can't be about the Hulk. They'd have shot me with a tranquilizer first. _ The American cleared his throat. "I'm Lt. Michael Hugo from the American Embassy. You _are_ the man who's been treating the Jose Zeledon family? Your name is Bruce Benton? Sir, there's a situation and we're asking for your help. These officers are OE, do you know what that means?"

Bruce nodded. Operaciones Especiales. The Nicaraguan equivalent to SWAT.

"Jose Zeledon died this morning. According to witnesses, after drinking a lot of cheap rum, his sons and nephews took an American tour group hostage at the Palacio Nacional de Cultura in an act of revenge. They're claiming that their father and uncle had been tortured by the Contras back in the 80's, and that the injuries he received from that treatment hastened his death. They are blaming the United States government for supporting the Contras and demanding a ransom and an official declaration from the American government taking responsibility for their father's torture and death. There are injured, and so far they are refusing to let any of them leave or to allow any medical personal to enter the Palacio to tend to the wounded."

He looked doubtfully at Bruce, who was painfully aware of the dirt smears on his T-shirt and jeans and the machine oil on his cheek. "They made a counter offer, though. They said they'd allow you to enter and take care of the wounded. Despite being an American, they apparently trust you. Miguel, the oldest and the spokesman, said you were their doctor. You're a civilian and we can't make you do this, but we're asking for your help. Will you volunteer? We'll fit you with a Kevlar vest and give you medical supplies. Mr. Benton, there are a number of teenagers in that tour group, including the daughter of a Michigan senator and the son of the head of the Department of Transportation. We need to get those people out safely, and you can buy us some time."

Bruce felt sad that the old man had died. He'd been getting weaker and weaker the last two days with congestive heart failure.

"Are all four sons and both nephews in on this?"

"Yes, sir, that's the intel that we have. Also, we believe that at least one of them is hurt with a gunshot wound. If you agree, we can take you straight there; we've cleared it with your supervisor."

He nodded, knowing this wasn't going to end well for him, the hostages, or those crazy Zeledon boys.

They flanked him as they left the factory, protected his head when he was put into the back of a police car for the ride to the plaza.

He remembered Natasha telling him that he had a way of falling right into trouble. _This wasn't my fault, Agent Romanoff._ He imagined she would lift one of her eyebrows in reply to that.

The embassy would run a background check on him while he was trying to end this standoff peacefully. His ID wouldn't stand up to any real scrutiny. He'd have to leave, be in the wind again until he found a new place to stay and regroup.

He had to run a gauntlet of news reporters to get to the police perimeter, but he kept his head lowered and a hand up hiding his face. He shrugged on the vest, and checked over the medical supplies that had been snatched from an ambulance. He asked for a few more items and some Lactated Ringers solution and IV supplies.

"Do you know what you're doing, senor?" One of the OEs asked him.

"Mmm, yes."

He worked fast and told the officers he was ready to cross the plaza. He asked to talk to Miguel and a short officer handed him the phone.

"Perdon, Miguel, this is Bruce. I'm coming inside to help. Don't shoot me. Gracias." Miguel gave a nervous chuckle and said as long as Bruce came alone he wouldn't be shot.

Bruce gave the phone back and placed the straps of the two duffel bags of medical supplies over his shoulders.

"Doctor Bruce Banner!"

It was a knee jerk reaction, but he turned and looked toward the person who had called his name and a barrage of cameras went off.

He started, and then sighed before turning his back on the reporter and cameramen who had no doubt bribed somebody in order to get this close to him. He couldn't worry about being outed. There were people in that building who needed help.

He walked quickly to the Palacio's doors. Daniel Zeledon, wild-eyed, pointing a gun towards the police and holding a plastic bottle of Joyita rum in his other hand, let him in and shut the door.

The End.

Author's note: _Walking the Path Between Welcome and Exile _is the first story in the series _Every Road Has Two Directions_.


End file.
